Rangel v. State

• Decision Date: 08 January 1887
• Parties: RANGEL <I>v.</I> STATE.<SMALL><SUP>1</SUP></SMALL>
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

3 S.W. 788

RANGEL

v. STATE.¹

Court of Appeals of Texas.

January 8, 1887.

Appeal from district court, Cameron county.

This was a conviction for theft had under an indictment, the charging part of which reads as follows: "* * * Jose Ma. Rangel on or about the fifteenth day of July, A. D. 1886, in Cameron county, Texas, did fraudulently take and steal from and out of the posession of, and without the consent of, John Kennedy, then and there holding same for the Kennedy Pasture Company one certain head of neat cattle, then and there the property of said Kennedy Pasture Company, and without the consent of the said Kennedy Pasture Company, with intent to deprive said John Kennedy and said Kennedy Pasture Company of the value thereof, and to appropriate the same to the use and benefit of him, the said Jose Ma. Rangel, against the peace and dignity of the state." The penalty imposed by the jury was a term of two years in the penitentiary. The rulings of the court do not call for a statement of the evidence.

No appearance for the appellant. Asst. Atty. Gen. Burts, for the State.

WHITE, P. J.

Objections to the indictment contained in appellant's motion in arrest of judgment were not maintainable, and it was not error to overrule said motion.

It was not error to permit the state, over objections of defendant, to introduce as witnesses against him the two particepes criminis, Juan Bravo and Atenogenes Segura, who were charged with the same offense by separate indictments. Parties charged as principals, accomplices, or accessories, whether in the same indictment or different indictments, cannot be introduced as witnesses for one another. This is statutory. Code Crim. Proc. art. 731. But we have no statute that parties so situated may not be introduced as witnesses against one another. In so far as the prosecution is concerned, the rule at common law with regard to the admissibility of such evidence is unchanged by our statute. "At common law, accomplices, under certain exceptions, before conviction and sentence, were competent witnesses either for or against each other; and this rule has not been so changed by the Code of this state as to disqualify such witnesses from testifying in behalf of the state." Myers v. State, 3 Tex. App. 8.

While the witness Juan Bravo was testfying, the district attorney handed witness a paper purporting to be a certificate of the brand of the Kennedy Pasture Company, the alleged owner of the animal in question; a representation of the brand being contained in said certificate. After witness had examined the same,...