People v. Quimby

• Decision Date: 03 November 1903
• Citation: 134 Mich. 625,96 N.W. 1061
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: PEOPLE v. QUIMBY.

96 N.W. 1061

134 Mich. 625

PEOPLE v. QUIMBY.

Supreme Court of Michigan

November 3, 1903

Error to Circuit Court, Gratiot County; George P. Stone, Judge.

Sarah Quimby was convicted of murder, and she brings error. Affirmed.

Jno. T. Mathews, for appellant.

Charles A. Blair, Atty. Gen., M. R. Salter, Pros. Atty., and Julius B. Kirby, for the People.

MOORE J.

The respondent was convicted of murdering, on the 20th of May 1901, Beatrice Bailey, nine years old, a daughter by her first husband. She was sentenced to imprisonment for life. The theory of the prosecution was that Peatrice came to her death from the effects of morphine poison administered by the respondent with criminal intent. It was the theory of the respondent's counsel that the respondent was insane, and not responsible for her actions; that on the night in question Elmer Quimby, the husband of the respondent, was present when the poison was administered, and administered it, or at least caused it to be done, if in fact Beatrice died from the effects of morphine poison. After the case was tried, a motion was made for a new trial upon the ground of newly discovered evidence and upon the ground that the court erred in several particulars in his rulings and in his charge. The motion for a new trial was overruled. The case is brought here by writ of error.

The respondent exhausted her peremptory challenges, and was not satisfied with the jury then obtained. She challenged for cause three jurors. Her challenges were overruled, and, in order to excuse them, she was obliged to challenge them peremptorily. The first question is, should the court have sustained the challenge for cause? If the challenge for cause should have been sustained in any of the instances where it was overruled, it was in the case of the juror Sherman. The record discloses the following: 'Q. Then you have an opinion? What do you mean by a partial opinion? A. It is not a real strong opinion. Q. That partial or part opinion? A. It is abiding with me now. Q. Fixed and abiding in your mind? A. Yes. Q. If you were a juror in this case, you would start in in the trial with that opinion now? A. I could not help it. Q. It would take evidence to break that opinion, would it not? A. Yes, certainly.' On the cross-examination he said: 'Q. You say that that is a partial opinion? A. It is. Q. You mean you have an impression or opinion formed by reading? A. That is it exactly. Q. An impression as to the guilt or innocence of the defendant? A. Yes. Q. What do you say about whether you could lay aside that impression you have formed, and could, upon the evidence given here in court, base your verdict solely upon the evidence, and render a verdict in accordance with it? A. I think I could. By the court: Q. Did you ever talk with any one who claimed to know--have personal knowledge of--any of the facts? A. No, sir. Q. All you ever heard or have known about it, whatever, is what you have read in the newspapers? A. Yes. Q. Can you recall how many papers you read that in? A. I think it was two, the News and Free Press. Q. Did that statement purport to give a detailed statement of it, or was it a mere mention of the matter? I understand that newspaper account didn't make a sufficient impression on your mind so that you can now recall what you did read about it. A. Why, certainly. Q. You can't now remember what you read? A. No, I cannot. Q. That didn't make enough impression upon your mind--that newspaper article--so that you can now recall what you read? A. No, it didn't. It has been quite a spell ago. Q. But you remember reading about it? A. Yes. Q. And you remember that reading made some impression on your mind? A. Upon my mind, yes. Q. Would that impression be such that it would embarrass you in any way from giving the defendant the presumption of innocence, and starting in with the presumption of innocence clear through the trial, and rendering a fair and impartial verdict upon the evidence introduced here, and the charge of the court? Would you be embarrassed in any way in that by that impression? A. I think not. The Court: I think the challenge may be overruled. Mr Leet: Mr. Sherman, you say that you now have an opinion in reference to the guilt or innocence of the defendant in this case? A. That is what I said. Mr. Leet: We challenge him for cause. The Court: Overruled.' It is said by counsel for respondent that the case is controlled by People v. Thacker, 108 Mich. 652, 66 N.W. 562. It must be confessed the case now under consideration is near the border line, but we think it distinguishable from the case of People v. Thacker. In that case the juror had talked with Mr. Waterbury, a member of the jury which was impaneled by the coroner, who claimed to state the circumstances of the case, and the juror believed what Mr Waterbury stated was true. In the case at bar the juror talked with no one who had personal knowledge of any of the facts connected with the alleged crime. In Holt v. People, 13 Mich. 228, it is said: 'To require that jurors shall come to the investigation of criminal charges with minds entirely unimpressed by what they may have heard in regard to them, or entirely without information concerning them, would be, in many cases, to exclude every man from the panel who was fit to sit there. With the present means of information the facts or rumors concerning an atrocious crime are, in a very few hours, or days at the farthest, spread before every man of reading and intelligence within the district from which jurors are to be drawn, and over the whole country if the atrocity be especially great. And there are some crimes so great and striking that even the most ignorant will have information and impressions in regard to them; and the rule, as stated, applied to such cases, would render the impaneling of a jury for their trial impossible, and make their very enormity a complete protection from punishment. Without attempting or desiring to lay down rules for all cases, it is sufficient for us to say that the showing in the present case falls far short of establishing cause for challenge. The juror is shown to have formed a partial opinion, but not a positive opinion. This opinion was not based upon anything he had himself witnessed, or from information derived from those who claimed to know the facts, but upon street rumors. Now, when a person says he has formed, from street rumors, a partial, but not a positive, opinion, we think he is to be understood as speaking only of those impressions which every one receives insensibly when a charge of crime is made, but which, so far from amounting to settled convictions, do not in the least preclude an impartial examination of the facts when afterwards presented in the form of legal testimony. We understand him to speak of that class of impressions which were held by Chief Justice Marshall to be no ground for excluding a juror: 'Those light impressions, which may be fairly supposed to yield to the testimony that may be offered,' and 'Which may leave the mind open to a fair consideration of the testimony'; not of 'those strong and deep impressions, which will close the mind against the testimony that may be offered in opposition to them, which will combat that testimony, and resist its force.' 1 Burr's Trial, 416. See, also, Osiander's Case, 3 Leigh, 785, 24 Am. Dec. 693; Smith v. Eames, 3 Scam. 78, 36 Am. Dec. 515; Bradford v. State, 15 Ind. 351; State v. Potter, 18 Conn. 174, 175.' See Stephens v. People, 38 Mich. 739; Ulrich v. People, 39 Mich. 246. In People v. Barker, 60 Mich. 277, 27 N.W. 539, 1 Am. St. Rep. 501, it was said: 'The opinion entertained by a juror which disqualifies him is an opinion of that fixed character which repels the presumption of innocence in a criminal case, and in whose mind the accused stands condemned already. It is not because it will require some evidence to remove impressions or opinions formed from rumors, newspaper statements, or from whatever other sources these impressions may have been received, that a juror is disqualified. The sources of information are important in determining the effect likely to have been produced upon the mind of the juror, and the influence likely to be exerted upon his judgment; but the human mind is so constituted that impressions made upon it which lead toward certain conclusions, whether reached or not, will always require other impressions to be made to eradicate the former ones, or to lead towards different conclusions; in other words, will require some evidence to remove them. We all are conscious that notions entertained by us are not all of the same stable character, and range all the way from conviction, which is the ultimate effect of ratiocination, to the passing comment or idle words that leave no permanent impression. The question, therefore, must be always one of degree, and the trier is called upon to determine whether the opinion entertained by the juror is of that fixed or permanent character which disqualifies him from coming to the case in a fair, candid, and impartial frame of mind, which is unaffected with prejudice or favor to either party.' In the case of People v. Foglesong, 116 Mich. 556, 74 N.W. 730, this question was under discussion. The court referred to the case of People v. Thacker, and held that, while a proper result was reached in the case, some of the language used therein was not a correct statement of the law. The court also used the following language: 'It is not possible for a murder to be committed without it being the subject of wide-spread comment, and it becomes the subject of many newspaper articles, so that wideawake and intelligent men, who read newspapers, are almost sure to learn something of what is claimed in relation to whether a crime has been...