Spiers v. State, 40489
| Decision Date | 06 May 1957 |
| Docket Number | No. 40489,40489 |
| Citation | 94 So.2d 803,231 Miss. 307 |
| Parties | Jack SPIERS v. STATE of Missippippi. |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
Henry Mounger, Ernest R. Duff, Hammond & Pope, Roy J. Goss, Columbia, for appellant.
Joe T. Patterson, Atty. Gen., by J. R. Griffin, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
The appellant, Jack Spiers, was convicted in the Circuit Court of Marion County on a charge of constructive contempt of court. He was sentenced to pay a fine of $100 and costs and to serve a term of thirty days in jail, the jail term being suspended until July 1, 1957. He appeals from the judgment of conviction.
The appellant assigns as error the following: (1) The court erred in finding the appellant guilty upon evidence that was wholly insufficient to constitute proof beyond a reasonable doubt, and (2) the court erred in rendering a judgment against the appellant based on and resulting from bias, prejudice, passion and prejudgment.
It is conceded that if the appellant is guilty of the acts charged against him, the same constitute constructive contempt of court, and this Court has, under a similar state of facts, just recently so held in the case of Young v. State, Miss., 93 So.2d 452, decided March 11, 1957. It is conceded, too, that the offense of constructive contempt of court is criminal in nature and that the burden of proof rests upon the state to establish the guilt of the accused beyond a reasonable doubt.
We are accordingly confronted on this appeal with the question whether there was sufficient evidence to warrant the circuit judge in finding that the guilt of the appellant was established beyond a reasonable doubt, or whether the evidence was insufficient to support the finding of the circuit judge and his decision resulted from bias, prejudice, passion and prejudgment of the case.
The charge against the appellant arose in connection with the case of State of Mississippi v. Millard Taylor, who was charged by indictment with the murder of Bob Hathorne. The Taylor case was docketed for trial at the November 1956 term of circuit court of Marion County, and a special venire had been drawn for the trial of the cause. One John Lloyd Day was summoned as a member of the special venire and was a prospective juror in the case. It was charged in the information filed against the appellant that while the Taylor case was pending and while the court was sitting and in session, the appellant, knowing that Day was a member of the special venire, approached him and offered him $100 if he would qualify as a member of the jury to try Taylor and vote for his acquittal. On the basis of this charge an information was filed against the appellant praying that he be cited to appear before the judge of the Circuit Court of Marion County to show cause why he should not be adjudged in constructive contempt of court. The appellant filed a written answer to the charges preferred against him in the information wholly denying the charges. His trial resulted as above stated.
The proof introduced by the State consisted of the testimony of one witness, namely, John Lloyd Day. Day testified that he was 37 years of age and was married and had four children; that he lived in Marion County about three miles southeast of Hub; that he was a deacon in the church and a Sunday School superintendent; that he knew the appellant by sight but that they were not friends and that neither had visited the other in their respective homes; that he had been summoned as a member of the special venire in the Millard Taylor case; that on Sunday afternoon, December 2, 1956, at about 5:30 o'clock, the appellant came to his home and stopped his car in front of his house; that his daughter or his kids or his wife told him there was someone out front who wanted to see him; that he went out and met the appellant and that they sat in the appellant's car and talked awhile, and that the appellant told him that he knew he had been summoned on the jury in the Taylor case and that he then proposed to him that if he would qualify on the jury and vote to acquit Taylor he would pay him $100 in cash after the trial, and that it would be sent to him and he would not have to come for it; that he told his wife and his father about the incident but did not otherwise disclose it until he was required to do so when he was testifying under oath on being examined as to his qualifications as a prospective juror in the Taylor case; that upon such examination he was asked if he had been approached about the case by anyone since he was summoned as a member of the special venire, and that he then had to relate what had happened or lie about it; that he was then asked if what had happened would have any bearing upon his decision in the case, and he said it would as the attempt to bribe him had set him against Taylor; that he was then excused from jury service.
The proof introduced on behalf of the appellant consisted of the testimony of the appellant, his wife, Mrs. Jack Spiers, his son-in-law, Lewis Holmes, Jimmy Harriell, who worked for a lessee of the land owned by the appellant, and Abb Turnage, who was the father-in-law of the said Jimmy Harriell, and also worked on land owned by the appellant. The appellant, testifying in his own behalf, wholly denied the charges preferred against him. He testified that he returned to his home on the Sunday in question at about three o'clock in the afternoon and remained there until the next morning; that he had a paved driveway into his premises which enabled him to drive his car and park the same opposite his kitchen door in order that he might the more easily get in and out of his car; that he was crippled, being paralyzed from his waist down; that he parked his car in the usual place on the Sunday afternoon in question and that it there remained until the next morning. He further testified that he did not know John Lloyd Day and had never had any trouble with him, and that he was unable to assign and reason why the said Day should falsely accuse him.
Mrs. Spiers, the wife of the appellant, corroborated the testimony of her husband. She said that he had returned to his home on the Sunday afternoon in question at about three o'clock and had parked his car in the usual place and that he remained at home until about seven o'clock the next morning; that nobody came to the home to see him except his son-in-law, Lewis Holmes, who came there about five o'clock on the Sunday afternoon in...
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Evans v. State
...testified for the defense. However, the strength or weakness of testimony is not measured by the number of witnesses. Spiers v. State, 231 Miss. 307, 94 So.2d 803 [1957]. In a criminal prosecution, the jury may accept the testimony of some witnesses and reject that of others, and may accept......
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...or weakness of the testimony is not measured by the number of witnesses." Groseclose, 440 So.2d at 300. See also Spiers v. State, 231 Miss. 307, 94 So.2d 803 (1957), and Bond v. State, 249 Miss. 352, 162 So.2d 510 Suffice it to say that the credible evidence in this case establishes that Ro......
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Sturdivant v. State, 1998-KA-01092-SCT.
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Liebling v. The Mississippi Bar, 2004-BA-01565-SCT.
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