Snyder v. Commonwealth
| Decision Date | 07 January 1878 |
| Citation | 85 Pa. 519 |
| Parties | Snyder <I>versus</I> The Commonwealth. |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Before AGNEW, C. J., SHARSWOOD, MERCUR, GORDON, PAXSON, WOODWARD and STERRETT, JJ.
Error to the Court of Oyer and Terminer of Crawford county: Of October and November Term 1877, No. 247 H. L. Richmond & Son and A. B. Richmond, for plaintiff in error.—To admit the evidence of the daughter was permitting the Commonwealth to give evidence of a distinct offence in no way connected with the issue trying — proving a rape on a charge of murder, without pretending that there was any connection between the two offences; to prejudice the jury in their verdict on the primary charge, by receiving evidence of another offence of a most revolting character, without any opportunity to defendant to prove its utter falsity. Evidence to character must be general evidence of reputation, and not particular acts of good or bad conduct.
Pearson Church, for defendant.
The paper-book of the plaintiff in error is very defective; it lacks much that would assist us in acquiring a clear understanding of the case. Unfortunately the defect is in no manner removed by the defendant, who has omitted to furnish us with any paperbook. We are therefore left to grope our way as best we can. Whenever an argument is needed on the part of a defendant, justice to the cause and to the court, requires that a paper-book should be prepared.
The plaintiff in error was indicted for murder. He was charged with the murder of an illegitimate child of his daughter. The daughter was a witness against her father. As we understand her testimony, she swore, at least in chief, to being present and hearing him commit an act which resulted in the death of her child. On the part of the defence it was claimed that this prosecution was a wicked scheme to ruin and destroy him; that the charge of murder was not at first made. To show this fact, and thus to cast discredit on the testimony of the daughter, the plaintiff in error gave in evidence two transcripts of complaints against him, made after the alleged killing of the child. One made by the daughter charging him with incestuous adultery with her; the other by a friend of her, using her as a witness, charging him with incestuous rape. We do not understand that the plaintiff in error affirmed or denied the truth of the facts averred in either of those complaints. His object in giving them in evidence was to show that she did not then charge him with murder, but with other and lesser offences. By proving that those offences only were then charged against him, he sought to impair the force of her testimony in regard to her knowledge of his having previously committed the murder now claimed.
As rebutting, the...
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