People v. Deacons

• Decision Date: 04 May 1888
• Citation: People v. Deacons, 109 N.Y. 374, 16 N.E. 676 (N.Y. 1888)
• Parties: PEOPLE v. DEACONS.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

109 N.Y. 374

16 N.E. 676

PEOPLE

v.DEACONS.

Court of Appeals of New York.

May 4, 1888.

Appeal from oyer and terminer, Monroe county.

This is an appeal under Laws 1887, c. 493, by defendant, Edward A. Deacons, from a judgment in the court of oyer and terminer upon a conviction for murder in the first degree.

Wm. H. Davis, for appellant.

Geo. A. Benton, for respondent.

FINCH, J.

The conviction of the prisoner is sought to be reversed upon two principal grounds: one that his confessions of the murder should have been excluded, and the other that his offense was less in degree than that established by the verdict of the jury.There was no error in admitting those confessions.They were made to the officers having him in charge, to the public prosecutor, to the reporters of the newspapers, and in some singular verses which he seems to have composed of his own volition, and without suggestion from any quarter.The Code of Criminal Procedure provides (section 395) that the confession of the defendant may be given in evidence ‘unless made under the influence of fear, produced by threats, or unless made upon a stipulation of the district attorney that he shall not be prosecuted therefor.’Not only does the testimony of those to whom the confession was made show that no threats at any time were used to extort a confession, but the prisoner himself, when upon the stand as a witness, and wholly denying his crime, made no such complaint, and stated no fact even remotely tending to establish a threat.He says that one of the officers charged him with the murder; that they impressed upon his mind the idea that they had evidence enough to convict; and hinted that if he confessed he might possibly escape with a conviction of manslaughter, or even obtain a reward.He thus swears to his own conclusions or inferences, but does not repeat or specify a single remark or expression used by any one which involved a threat.The officers, on the other hand, state fully the whole conversation in each instance, and show conclusively that no threats were made.The district attorney explicitly refused to make any promises whatever, and it is quite apparent that neither threats nor promises induced the confession.

It is claimed, however, that the verdict rested mainly upon it, and should not have done so for another reason.The Code of Criminal Procedure, in the last clause of the section above referred to, further provides that the confession shall not be sufficient to warrant a conviction ‘without additional proof that the crime charged has been committed,’ and it is claimed that the finding of the body was not such additional proof.That is a mistaken construction.The crime charged was the murder of Mrs. Stone.That fact was conclusively proved by the finding of her dead body with the unmistakable marks of a murder committed.The meaning of the Code is that there must be some other evidence of the corpus delicti besides the confession, the purpose being to require some proof of the death, and the violence which caused it, outside of and beyond the mere confession of the prisoner.In a case where the body is not found, and there is no proof of violence or of death except by the confession of the accused that confession will not suffice.There must be some other evidence of the existence of the criminal fact to which the confession relates.The Code but repeats the pre-existing rule that ‘there must be proof aliunde of the corpus delicti, although such proof need not be conclusive.’People v. Badgley, 16 Wend. 53.Upon that confession and the other facts proven in the case the verdict of murder in the first degree must be sustained.While the prisoner admitted himself to be utterly regardless of the truth, denouncing his own statements by the score as unmitigated lies, yet if we take his version of the murder as in all respects true, the necessary deliberation was manifest and fully established.Admitting, then, for the present that he struck Mrs. Stone with his club, and then choked her so that he broke both branches of the hyoid bone in her throat until he thought she was dead, and did this under a sudden passionate impulse because she used harsh words and struck him in the face, that does not explain what followed.Deliberation marked every subsequent step, and a deliberation utterly inconsistent with any remaing passionate impulse.If there had been rage it was satisfied by the revenge accomplished, and was supplanted by the cool and deliberate effort to avoid the consequences and escape detection.He puts a cloth under the victim's head to prevent blood stains on the floor; he observes the trap door leading into the cellar, and opens it to hide the body; he lifts Mrs. Stone in a manner which he says he knew how to do without getting blood-stains upon himself; he carries her down the stairs where she slips from his hands; at that moment she revives, for he admits a struggle at that point; he sees she is not dead; and he then strangles her with a cloth tied about her neck.He says she fought like a tiger.That is quite probable.The blood spot at the foot of the stairs indicates the struggle.The unfortunate woman was fighting for her life and the prisoner for her death as the means of his own safety.It was no longer a passionate impluse or sudden burst of rage.That had run its course.There had been abundant time for the passion to cool, and ample opportunity to deliberate.What that deliberation was we see in every step he took, and there is no reasonable or adequate explanation of his conduct except that he strangled his victim for the deliberate purpose of screening himself by her death from the detection which threatened him when she revived.When Mrs. Stone was apparently dead, after the combined blow and choking, the prisoner says, in words chosen by himself: ‘I stood gazing at her with terror and with dread.’That is so natural that it may easily be believed, and it marks the appearance of new emotions consequent upon the subsidence of momentary passion, and growing out of the silent contemplation of the seeming death and the imminent danger which that passion had occasioned.The jury were warranted in believing that if his own account was true he...