People v. Lewis

• Decision Date: 12 February 1941
• Docket Number: No. 25827.,25827.
• Citation: 31 N.E.2d 795,375 Ill. 330
• Parties: PEOPLE v. LEWIS.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

375 Ill. 330

31 N.E.2d 795

PEOPLE

v.LEWIS.

No. 25827.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Dec. 12, 1940.

Rehearing Denied Feb. 12, 1941.

Error to Criminal Court, Cook County; Robert J. Dunne, Judge.

John W. Lewis was convicted of manslaughter, and he brings error.

Affirmed.Herbert M. Wetzel and Sylvester J. Konenkamp, both of Chicago, for plaintiff in error.

John E. Cassidy, Atty. Gen., Thomas J. Courtney, State's Atty., of Chicago, and A. B. Dennis, of Springfield (Edward E. Wilson, John T. Gallagher, and Melvin S. Rembe, all of Chicago, of counsel), for defendant in error.

STONE, Justice.

The sole question presented in this cause is whether one charged by an indictment with murder may be convicted thereunder of manslaughter in the absence of any specific charge of the latter offense in the indictment. The cause is here on writ of error to the criminal court of Cook county, sued out by John W. Lewis, who was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to the penitentiary for from one to fourteen years, under an indictment of two counts, each charging him with murder. He pleaded not guilty, waived a jury trial and the cause was heard by the court without a jury. The trial court found him ‘guilty of manslaughter in manner and form as charged in the indictment.’ No question of fact is involved. The common law record alone is presented to this court.

The first court of the indictment, omitting formal allegations, charges that Lewis unlawfully, feloniously, wilfully and of his malice aforethought stabbed Carl Edward Hill in various parts of his head, trunk and legs with a certain knife, thereby inflicting wounds of which Hill died. It concludes with the charge that Lewis ‘unlawfully, feloniously, wilfully and of his malice aforethought killed and murdered said Carl Edward Hill in manner and form * * * and by the means aforesaid; contrary to the statute, and against the peace and dignity of the People of the State of Illinois.’ The second count charges that Lewis ‘did unlawfully, with malice aforethought, by stabbing kill and murder’ Hill.

Plaintiff in error claims that as malice aforethought is an element of murder, and manslaughter is an unlawful killing without malice express or implied, and without any admixture of deliberation whatever, the offenses are different, and that he was convicted of an offense with which he was not charged, in violation of the due process clause of the State and Federal constitutions. He argues that this amounts to exempting the indictment and the proceedings from the constitutional requirement, and is an arbitrary and unreasonable classification in violation of his constitutional rights. Defendant in error's position is that the charge of murder includes therein a charge of manslaughter. These contentions constitute the decisive issue.

Constitutional guarantees should be interpreted in a broad and liberal spirit. People v. Spain, 307 Ill. 283, 138 N.E. 614;Arndstein v. McCarthy, 254 U.S. 71, 41 S.Ct. 26, 65 L.Ed. 138. They negative any form of procedure which arbitrarily singles out any individual or class and permits them to be dealt with in a manner arbitrarilyor unreasonably different from that in which others similarly situated are dealt with. O'Connor. v. Rathje, 368 Ill. 83, 12 N.E.2d 878;United States v. Reese, 92 U.S. 214, 23 L.Ed. 563. Section 9 of article 2 of the Illinois constitution, Smith-Hurd Stats., guarantees to every person accused of crime the right to demand the nature and cause of the accusation. The purpose of this guarantee is to secure to the accused such specific designation of the offense charged as will enable him to prepare his defense and plead the judgment in bar of a subsequent prosecution for the same offense. West v. People, 137 Ill. 189, 27 N.E. 34,34 N.E. 254;People v. Brown, 336 Ill. 257, 168 N.E. 289; United States v. Reese, supra. These principles invoked by plaintiff in error are well established and are conceded by defendant in error.

Plaintiff in error argues that the proceeding cannot be justified by the frequently repeated pronouncement that at common law ‘every indictment for murder necessarily includes by implication a count for manslaughter;’ that there are no common law crimes in Illinois, but all felonies in this State are defined by and required to be prosecuted under the statute, and indictments must be construed in accordance with the Criminal Code. He emphasizes the fact that the indictment in this case concludes ‘contrary to the statute,’ clearly indicating this is a proceeding for a statutory, and not a common law offense. The answer to this is that the same elements that constitute the crimes of murder and manslaughter at common law are embraced in the statute. Hence the offenses are the same as at common law. It follows that the statute is to be interpreted as was the common law. The act adopting the common law, (Ill.Rev.Stat.1939, chap. 28, sec. 1) provides: ‘That the common law of England, so far as the same is applicable and of a general nature, * * * shall be the rule of decision, and shall be considered as of full force until repealed by legislative authority.’ By virtue of this section the decisions of the common law courts of England are in force in this State. Kreitz v. Behrensmeyer, 149 Ill. 496, 36 N.E. 983,24 L.R.A. 59;Lasier v. Wright, 304 Ill. 130, 136 N.E. 545, 28 A.L.R. 674. Furthermore, section 8 of division 13 of the Criminal Code, (Ill.Rev.Stat.1939, chap. 38, par. 736) provides: ‘All trials for criminal offenses shall be conducted according to the course of the common law, except when this act points out a different mode, and the rules of evidence of the common law shall also be binding upon all courts and juries in criminal cases except as otherwise provided by law.’ Thus, the substantive and the procedural common law are applicable in this case.

The element that distinguishes murder from manslaughter, or which marks the boundary between the two grandes of homicide, is malice. 26 Am.Jur. (Homicide) sec. 12. The common factor and the essential element which constitutes a crime under either charge is the unlawful killing of a human being. Malice is the element which marks the degree of turpitude. Thus, an indictment for murder includes, not only the charge of the unlawful killing of a human being, but likewise, that it was done with malice aforethought. By such an indictment the accused is charged not with a different offense from manslaughter but with all the elements of that offense, and further that the committed them with malice aforethought. It is a well established rule of the common...