People v. Harrison

• Decision Date: 21 February 1914
• Citation: 261 Ill. 517,104 N.E. 259
• Parties: PEOPLE v. HARRISON.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

261 Ill. 517

104 N.E. 259

PEOPLE

v.HARRISON.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Feb. 21, 1914.

Error to Circuit Court, Marion County; Albert M. Rose, Judge.

Ernest Harrison and another were convicted of kidnapping, and the named defendant brings error. Reversed and remanded.Bundy & Wham, of Centralia, for plaintiff in error.

P. J. Lucey, Atty. Gen., Samuel N. Finn, State's Atty., of Salem, and Arthur R. Roy, of Quincy, for the People.

DUNN, J.

Ernest Harrison and Frank Sullens were indicted for kidnapping for ransom, were convicted, and sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment in the penitentiary, and Harrison has sued out a writ of error.

Sullens was 18 years old, Harrison 26. Sullens, upon being arrested, made a confession to the officers, and afterwards, while in jail, made statements at different times which were introduced in evidence and his guilt is now in question. He also testified at the preliminary examination but not on the trial. The victim of the crime was a schoolgirl just two months under 16 years old, who lived with her father in the city of Salem. About 9 o'clock in the evening of March 13, 1913, as she was returning from a picture show which she had attended with a girl friend, she was accosted a short distance from her home by Frank Sullens, whom she knew by sight as the son of the night marshal of the town but had never spoken to. He called to her to wait, and she did so, supposing him to be a neighbor boy. When he came up he asked where her brother was, and walking with her toward her home, told her that she and her brother must be careful as there were men on watch to catch them on her father's account, because her father had been prosecuting some of the ‘bootleggers.’ As they approached the walk leading to the house Sullens seized her by the throat, threatening to kill her if she cried out, threw her down on the cement walk, and bumped her head against it until she became unconscious. The next thing she remembered was being in a field with Sullens and struggling to get away from him, but he compelled her to walk up and down along a railroad track somewhere. She did not remember leaving the railroad track, but she again became conscious in a field near a slaughterhouse and struggled to get away. She fainted again and knew nothing more until she regained consciousness in the loft of the slaughterhouse barn the next morning. She was alone. She got down and went home. She was in a dazed condition. Physicians were called, who discovered bruises on her person, an injury to her head caused by a severe blow, her face, lips, and neck swollen, the prints of a thumb and fingers on the sides of her neck, and conditions indicating that a rape had been committed upon her. She did not recover her normal mental condition for several days. Soon after her return to her father's house Sullens was arrested the same forenoon and stated that Harrison had hired him to do what he had done. His statement was taken down in writing and signed by him, saying that Harrison had given him $5 the night before the crime was committed to kidnap the girl, take her to the old coal mine, and turn her over to Harrison to hold her for a ransom or reward. Upon his statement Harrison also was arrested between 2 and 3 o'clock in the afternoon of the same day.

It has been argued that the evidence is insufficient to establish the corpus delicti or to connect the plaintiff in error with the commission of the crime. Since error occurred on the trial for which the judgment must be reversed, we shall not discuss the evidence further than may be necessary to the consideration of the errors so appearing in the record.

[1][2] Immediately upon Harrison's arrest he demanded to be confronted with Sullens and was taken to the jail, where, in the presence of the sheriff, two deputy sheriffs, and several other witnesses, an interview took place between the two. A conversation took place in which Sullens made statements incriminating Harrison, and these statements, together with the whole conversation, were introduced in evidence against Harrison over his objection. In the course of this interview the paper which Sullens had signed was read aloud in Harrison's hearing and was characterized by him, with much profanity, as a lie. One of the witnesses testified that before the paper was read Harrison asked Sullens, ‘What is all this stuff you have been telling on me?’ and, when Sullens declared it was true, answered, with an oath, that it was a lie, and when it was read he merely shrugged his shoulders. As to what occurred at the beginning of the interview he agrees with the other three witnesses who gave an account of it, but he disagrees with them in their statement that when the paper was read Harrison said it was a lie. Another of the witnesses testified that he did not think Harrison denied all the statements made by Sullens. His testimony as to what was said, however, indicated that Harrison did deny everything that Sullens said. The witness explained that Harrison said that Sullens was a liar, but the witness did not understand that remark as applying to the statement at the time. He said the statement was read over to Sullens; he was asked if it was true and said it was; and then Harrison said to him that he was a liar. The witness said he understood that Harrison was addressing his remarks to Sullens and not particularly to the statements made. The witness was unable to state any particular thing which he thought was not denied, and we are unable to see any ground for saying that a statement has not been denied when the person to whom it is addressed tells the person making it, at its conclusion, that he is a liar. It is not necessary to deny the statement in the language in which it is made or in detail. A general denial of the whole statement is sufficient. The principle on which statements made in the presence of a person accused of crime and received in evidence against him is that his silence, when he might, and naturally would, deny statements imputing guilt to him if they were untrue, is regarded as an acquiescence in their truth and an implied admission of guilt. Ackerson v. People, 124 Ill. 563, 16 N. E. 847;Matthews v. State, 55 Ala. 187;State v. Walker, 78 Mo. 380;Richards v. State, 82 Wis. 172, 51 N. W. 652; Wharton on Crim. Evidence (8th Ed.) § 679; Underhill on Crim. Evidence, § 122. Unless the words or conduct of the accused, under the circumstances, is such that it is a natural and reasonable inference that he admitted the truth of the charge, such statements are inadmissible. O'Hearn v. State, 79 Neb. 513, 113 N. W. 130,25 L. R. A. (N. S.) 542;Merriweather v. Commonwealth, 118 Ky. 870, 82 S. W. 592,4 Ann. Cas. 1039. If a defendant is charged with a crime and unequivocally denied it, and this is the whole conversation, it cannot be introduced in evidence against him as an admission. Fitzgerald v. Williams, 148 Mass. 462, 20 N. E. 100; Ware v. State, 96 Ga. 353,23 S. E. 410. If he makes a reply admitting the truth of the statement, wholly or in part, both the statement and reply are competent evidence. Commonwealth v. Kenney, 12 Metc. (Mass.) 235, 46 Am. Dec. 672;Commonwealth v. Trefethen, 157 Mass. 180, 31 N. E. 961,24 L. R. A. 235.

In his written statement Sullens said that on Wednesday night, March 12th, about 7 o'clock in the evening, Harrison gave him $5 in the rear of the Dr. Green building, across the street from the city hall, and that for that consideration he agreed to kidnap the girl and turn her over to Harrison, who was to hold her for ransom or reward, and that before entering into the contract Harrison gave him several drinks of whisky. One witness testified that when the statement was read to Harrison the witness asked him if it was true that he was at that place at that time, back of the restaurant, and Harrison said it was not true; that he was not ever back there but that he had met Sullens on the east side of the street, near the Sullens barber shop, and stepped off the walk there back into a shed and gave him a drink one night that week but he did not remember what night, but that being back of the restaurant was absolutely false. Another witness testified that Harrison first denied seeing Sullens at all that day, but finally said that he did see him in the afternoon, across the street, and had given him a drink of whisky across the street, between the barber shop and Hull's store on the east side of Broadway, and that Harrison said there were no witnesses who could prove that they saw him in the presence of Sullens near the Green building on the night of March 12th or near the Eagan restaurant. A third witness testified that Harrison positively denied having been on the west side of Main street, around the Green building, in company with Sullens that night, but said that he had been with him on the east side of Broadway, between the Hull building where Hull has his little store and the barber shop, and they drank together there. There was nothing in these statements that had any tendency to show Harrison's guilt. They were entirely immaterial on that question. They explicitly denied Sullens' statement. Whether, at another time and place than that mentioned by Sullens, Harrison and Sullens had drank together had no tendency to throw any light upon the question whether Harrison had induced Sullens to commit this crime. Harrison's statement had no tendency to show that Sullens' statement, or any part of it, was true. No part of the conversation at the jail when Sullens' statement was read was admissible in evidence against Harrison, and his objections to it should have been sustained.

[3] The court permitted two physicians and other witnesses, over the objection of plaintiff in error, to describe the physical condition of the girl after her return home the morning after the kidnapping, her disheveled hair, her bloody, soiled, and disordered clothing, her swollen face and neck, her bruised...