People v. Matthews

• Decision Date: 22 April 1969
• Docket Number: No. 3,Docket No. 4239,3
• Citation: 17 Mich.App. 48,169 N.W.2d 138
• Parties: PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Jesse James MATTHEWS, Defendant-Appellant
• Court: Court of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

Page 138

169 N.W.2d 138

17 Mich.App. 48

PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Jesse James MATTHEWS, Defendant-Appellant.

Docket No. 4239.

Court of Appeals of Michigan, Division No. 3.

April 22, 1969.

Released for Publication July 24, 1969.

William J. Heyns, Grand Rapids, for appellant.

Frank J. Kelley, Atty. Gen., Robert A. Derengoski, Sol. Gen., Lansing, James K. Miller, Pros. Atty., Kent County, Grand Rapids, for appellee.

Before LEVIN, P.J., and HOLBROOK and DANHOF, JJ.

PER CURIAM:

The defendant, Jessee James Matthews, appeals from a jury verdict of manslaughter. M.C.L.A. § 750.321 (Stat.Ann.1954 Rev. § 28.553). ¹ The victim, James Frizzell was stabbed by Matthews during a knife fight. At the trial Matthews claimed he acted in self-defense.

Before trial the defendant moved to suppress statements he made to the police on the night of his arrest and the following morning. He claimed that the police failed to warn him of his constitutional rights in accordance with the requirements enunciated in Miranda v. Arizona (1966), 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, 10 A.L.R.3d 974. Additionally, he asserted that because of his physical condition the statements he made were involuntary.

Four witnesses, including the defendant, testified at the hearing on the defendant's suppression motion, at the conclusion of which the trial court denied the motion. We have made an independent examination of the record (see People v. Pallister (1968), 14 Mich.App. 139, 165 N.W.2d 319) and find no error in the trial court's conclusions that the Miranda warnings were in fact given by the police and that the defendant's statements to the police were voluntary. ²

The defendant's second assignment of error concerns certain testimony introduced at the time of trial. Referring to prior knife fights in which he had participated, the defendant remarked to the police! 'No, Jimmy ain't dead. Look at me. I have been cut all over before and I'm not dead.' Defense counsel, anticipating that the statement would be offered during the trial, objected out of the presence of the jury to its use. The trial judge held the statement admissible.

The statement was elicited from police witnesses 3 different times during the course of the trial--all before the time the defendant took the stand. When the defendant testified, he attempted to explain his scars and participation in prior knife fights in an effort to neutralize this history of fighting with knives.

The introduction of the objected-to statement was erroneous. Evidence that tends to show that the accused person has committed other acts or crimes or has a disposition toward conduct similar to the offense charged is ordinarily inadmissible to prove the commission of the charged offense. This rule of law guards against convicting an accused person because he is a bad man. Barring such evidence prevents the trier of fact from inferring that the accused person is guilty of the charged offense because he has committed other similar acts or crimes.

The limited exception allowing such evidence to prove motive, intent, absence of mistake or accident, scheme, plan, or system in doing an act provided in M.C.L.A. § 768.27 (Stat.Ann.1954 Rev. § 28.1050) has been held by our Supreme Court to be inapplicable in a case such as this where the charge is manslaughter and the defendant claims he acted in self-defense. People v. Wright (1942), 294 Mich. 20, 292 N.W. 539. ³ In Wright the defendant shot the victim with a gun. The Supreme Court held evidence that the defendant had previously improperly used his gun inadmissible, and stated that evidence of past fights or altercations exceeded the bounds of the evidence admissible under the exception set out in the statute to which we have just referred.

The evidence of defendant's prior knife fights was legally irrelevant. Accordingly, the fact that the evidence was initially elicited from the defendant himself would not affect this irrelevancy or make the statement for that reason admissible. People v. Lundberg (1964), 364 Mich. 596, 603, 111 N.W.2d 809.

Defendant's statement about previous knife fights was admitted into evidence before he took the stand. During testimony by police officers, the statement was mentioned on 3 separate occasions. The defendant was asked to explain the statement when he subsequently took the stand. We have no way of knowing what evidence convinced the jury of the defendant's guilt. We cannot say that the evidence of prior fights might not have been weighed by the jury against the defendant in reaching the guilty verdict and, therefore, conclude that the error was prejudical and not harmless.

Since the case must be retried, we address ourselves to the defendant's third assignment of error. The trial judge's lengthy instruction on self-defense emphasized and re-emphasized that the jury must find that the defendant was not the aggressor in order to acquit him because of self-defense. ⁴ There was, however, no evidence whatsoever that the defendant was the aggressor.

The only eyewitness who testified, other than the defendant, stated that he did not see the beginning of the fight or the stabbing. He left the scene to get help before Frizzell was stabbed. The only evidence on the initiation of the affray was that given by the defendant himself. He testified that Frizzell was the aggressor. There was no basis for injecting the issue whether the defendant was the aggressor. ⁵

That a charge which injects an issue unsupported by the evidence is erroneous is well supported by the authorities. Brownell v. People (1878), 38 Mich. 732; People v. Goodrode (1903), 132 Mich. 542, 548, 94 N.W. 14; Mulcahy v. Argo Steel Construction Company (1966), 4 Mich.App. 116, 128, 129, 144 N.W.2d 614; Baker v. Alt (1965), 374 Mich. 492, 497, 132 N.W.2d 614. Generally, see 53 Am.Jur. Trial, §§ 573-575, p. 451 ff.

In Brownell v. People, Supra, the defendant was convicted of second-degree murder. The Michigan Supreme Court noted that the trial judge's charge in that case resembled charges given by other trial courts quoted in earlier Michigan reports but held that the evidence in that case did not support an instruction on the charged offense of murder (pp. 736, 737 of 38 Mich.):

'It seems to us that there is evidence in the record showing that in some respects charges which may have been correct abstract legal propositions, had some tendency to mislead the jury in considering the quality of the offense, because not warranted by the testimony.

'The circumstances of the attack, as shown by the prosecution, show that Bailey (the victim) was the aggressor, and had no possible excuse for it. There was nothing to warrant any discussion of murder unless upon a theory which the court permitted to be considered by the jury that Brownell had armed himself intending to kill Bailey on the first pretext or assault and took advantage of an attack that he might do so. There was no testimony which could be regarded as legally bearing in that direction, and it is not allowable for a jury to convict a man upon imagination. There must be proof which is enough to remove their doubts, and they cannot be permitted to eke it out by fancy. The charge which allowed them to act upon such a notion in determining between murder and other grades of homicide, or to act on it at all, was erroneous.'

Also pertinent is the Brownell Court's criticism of the portion of the charge respecting the provocation which would excuse the homicide because of the inclusion of (p. 737) 'remarks upon cooling time which had nothing to do with the case on trial.'

Likewise, in this case, it was error to have injected the question whether the defendant was the aggressor, there being no evidence that he was the aggressor. As the Brownell Court said (pp. 737):

'it is not allowable for a jury to convict a man upon imagination. There must be proof which is enough to remove their doubts, and they cannot be permitted to eke it out by fancy.'

We think this case is distinguishable from People v. Cellura (1939), 288 Mich. 54, 68, 284 N.W. 643. In Cellura the Court found that there was sufficient evidence from which the jury could conclude that the defendant was the aggressor. Cellura lived in the underworld. He testified that he had been told that two armed men driving a car with an Illinois license plate were looking for him and were going to take him 'for a ride.' Nevertheless, according to the defendant's own testimony, when three men in such an automobile called to him, he approached the automobile with his hand in his pocket on a gun...