Rice v. People
| Decision Date | 03 November 1913 |
| Citation | 55 Colo. 506,136 P. 74 |
| Parties | RICE v. PEOPLE. |
| Court | Colorado Supreme Court |
Error to District Court, Logan County; H. P. Burke, Judge.
Sam B Rice was convicted of assault and battery, and he brings writ of error. Affirmed
Munson & Munson and McConley & Hinkley, all of Sterling, for plaintiff in error.
Fred Farrar, Atty. Gen., and Clement F. Crowley, Asst. Atty. Gen for the State.
The defendant in error was convicted of assault and battery in the district court. The information charged, in four counts mayhem, an assault, an assault with a deadly weapon with intent to commit bodily injury, and an assault with intent to commit murder, on one Shaeffer. The charge of mayhem was withdrawn by the court from the jury, and will not be considered in the case. The defendant filed a motion to require the people to elect upon which count of the information they would proceed. This motion was overruled, and the action of the court in that behalf is assigned as error.
These different counts related to the same transaction as appears from the evidence. They related to one fight that took place, and were not several and distinct offenses, but arose from the same transaction or offense charged to have been committed in different ways for the purpose of meeting the evidence. The defendant could not have been guilty of more than one. No error was committed in overruling the motion to elect. Bergdahl v. People, 27 Colo. 302, 61 P. 228; Kelly v. People, 17 Colo. 130, 29 P. 805; White v. People, 8 Colo.App. 289, 45 P. 539.
The evidence showed that a son of the defendant and one Shaeffer began to quarrel, and thereupon one Walker, who was with the son, took the matter up and became engaged in a fist fight with Shaeffer. While the fight was going on, the defendant came up. He did not touch Shaeffer, and very soon after he arrived he stopped the fight. Thus far there is no conflict in the evidence. Evidence for the people was to the effect that Walker, without provocation, struck Shaeffer and began the fight; that when the defendant came up he said, applying a vulgar epithet to Shaeffer, 'Kill him; stomp him to death,' and came towards the combatants with a gun; that he then stopped the fight, because he saw two other men approaching; and that very shortly after the fight the defendant said, 'This has been running for 7 years; we finished it in 15 minutes; Shaeffer is whipped, and owned up to it.' The evidence for the defendant was to the effect that the defendant came up and immediately stopped the fight, and that he said nothing and did nothing to encourage it. Over the objection of the defendant, a witness was permitted to testify that about 17 months before the fight the witness was herding cattle for the defendant, and that the latter told the witness to kick Shaeffer's head off, and tried to hire him to commit an assault on Shaeffer. The witness also related later conversations that he had with the defendant.
It is a general rule, applied with considerable strictness, that in a trial for one offense evidence of another independent offense or act is inadmissible. To this rule, however, there are some well-defined exceptions, among which may be mentioned an instance when the former offense or act tends to prove a design or purpose on the part of the defendant which he likely carried out by committing the offense charged. Jaynes v. People, 44 Colo. 535, 99 P. 325, 16 Ann.Cas. 787; 1 Wigmore on Evidence, § 304.
The evidence objected to tended to prove that the defendant had it in his mind to have Shaeffer assaulted, and for that purpose had attempted to influence the witness. Now, if that was the defendant's purpose, it was probably true that he encouraged and aided the assault by saying and doing what the people's witnesses said he did when he came to where the fight was in progress. This view is strengthened somewhat by the other evidence which tended to prove that the fight had settled in 15 minutes what had been going on between Shaeffer and the defendant for 7 years. This last-mentioned evidence also removes the objection that the matter detailed by the witness, relative to his assaulting Shaeffer, was too remote in time from the offense charged, for, if it is true that the strife between Shaeffer and the defendant had been going on for 7 years, 17 months was well within that time. From the foregoing considerations, it seems plain that the evidence objected to was admissible.
There is no instruction set out in the abstract relative to the law of principal and accessory, and hence we are unable to say that any error was committed in the instruction, if any was given.
Objection is made to an instruction to the effect that every person is presumed to intend...
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People v. Fields, 82CA0628
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ARTICLE 3
...with intent to do bodily injury, and an assault with intent to commit murder, where all refer to the same transaction. Rice v. People, 55 Colo. 506, 136 P. 74 (1913). Allegation that defendant "did make an assault" sufficient. An indictment for assault with intent to rob under this section,......
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ARTICLE 3 OFFENSES AGAINST THE PERSON
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