People v. Johnson

• Decision Date: 03 October 1893
• Citation: 34 N.E. 920,139 N.Y. 358
• Parties: PEOPLE v. JOHNSON.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

139 N.Y. 358

34 N.E. 920

PEOPLE

v.JOHNSON.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Oct. 3, 1893.

Appeal from court of oyer and terminer, Cayuga county.

John Johnson was convicted of murder, and appeals. Affirmed.

Amasa J. Parker, for appellant.

Adelbert P. Rich, for the People.

EARL, J.

The defendant was indicted for murdering Charles Peck on the 17th day of April last. He was tried upon the indictment, and found guilty of murder in the first degree on the 17th day of May, and sentenced to suffer death during the week commencing July 3d. He appealed to this court, and his counsel alleges various errors for which he contends that his client should have a new trial. His main contention is that there was not sufficient evidence of premeditation and deliberation to authorize the conviction. The defendant and Peck were both convicts in the Auburn state prison. On the morning of April 17th the defendant had a fight with a fellow convict, in which he was the aggressor, in a room in which many convicts were at work. The fight was interrupted by one of the keepers of the prison, and two of the keepers took the defendant, and were removing him from the room. They reached a stairway with him, leading down into one of the rooms, and there he resisted by taking hold of the banisters. Then he broke away from the keepers, and stepped back into the room, drew an open knife from an inside pocket of his coat or vest, flourishing it, and making a threatening remark. At this time, we think, the evidence satisfactorily shows that no assault was being made upon him or threatened by any one. After he had drawn the knife, and was holding it in his hand in a threatening manner, a convict by the name of McDonald, being near the place, made the remark to the keepers, in substance, that ‘he has got a knife; he will kill some one, shoot him.’ The defendant then went towards him in a threatening attitude, and he took a stick and hit him on the head, and, retreating, fell down. The defendant then advanced about 15 feet upon Peck, and stabbed him with the knife. Peck then struck him with a broom handle and retreated, and the defendant followed him up, and, thrusting the knife into his heart, caused his instant death. Then, and not until then, the other convicts, in self-defense, and for the purpose of subduing him, surrounded him, and commenced to assault him, and in the affray he killed another convict and wounded others.

There does not seem to have been any particular motive prompting the defendant to kill Peck. He was evidently a reckless, brutal, passionate man, hating, as he testified, convicts, and determined on that account to kill any one who came in his way. But it is not necessary to look for a motive where the crime is plainly proved. He had concealed on his person the open knife, which we must assume he had no right under the prison discipline to have. Knowing it was a dangerous weapon, he rushed upon his victim, and dealt the fatal blow. The jury were abundantly justified in finding that he intended the consequences of his act. He drew the knife without provocation, being then in no danger, and threatened with no assault. He was in the hands of keepers who would protect him, and whose duty it was to protect him. He first tried to assault McDonald with the knife, and then advanced upon Peck, stabbed him once, and then, as Peck attempted to defend himself, and was retreating from him, he dealt him another and fatal stroke. While all this occupied but a few moments, there was time, although very brief, for deliberation and premeditation, and thus there was sufficient evidence for the jury of all the elements answering the statutory definition of murder in the first degree. People v. Clark, 7 N. Y. 385;Donohue v. People, 56 N. Y. 208;Leighton v. People, 88 N. Y. 117;People v. Majone, 91 N. Y. 211;People v. Hawkins, 109 N. Y. 408, 17 N. E. Rep. 371.

The pretense of self-defense has not a shadow of satisfactory evidence to rest on. The defendant could have gone down the stairs instead of rushing back into the room, and he would have been out of the way of the other convicts, and out of danger from any one. He knew that the keepers were competent and willing to protect him. He must have known that the only danger of any assault upon him came from the drawing and flourishing of the knife, and that his trouble with his fellow convicts would end with the dropping of the murderous weapon. The homicide was without provocation, and wholly without justification.

The defendant complains that the trial judge erred in allowing evidence of his murderous acts immediately after the killing of Peck. The evidence was competent as parts of the same transaction, and as bearing upon motive, intent, and other ingredients of the crime charged. The charge of the judge was full and fair, and the jury were properly instructed in the...