OPINION
NICHOLLS
J.
Defendant was convicted and sentenced to death on
the charge of murdering Mary J. Ayles. The defendant pleaded
"not guilty." He relies upon a claim that he was
insane when he committed the homicide. His counsel calls the
court's attention specially to two bills of exceptions
found in the record.
The
first of these two bills appears as bill of exceptions No. 4,
which recites that on the trial of the case the accused by
his counsel offered in evidence the certified copy of the
record in the criminal suit, No. 35,587 of the docket of the
criminal district court of the city of New Orleans, entitled
"State of Louisiana v. Mary J. Ayles," to show the
fact that the shooting of this woman, Alice Wells, while
lying in the bed with Edward Ayles, so shocked him as to
addle and derange his mind; that he is now, and has been ever
since the occurrence, a monomaniac; that this homicide, while
lying in bed with this woman, Alice Wells, deranged him to
such an extent as to make a crazy person of him, and affected
his mind to such a degree that he is now, and was at the time
he killed his wife, a paranoid, so insane that he is not
responsible for his act and has been growing worse every day;
that this record is offered to prove the above facts, and not
for the purpose of entering into the character of the
deceased, Mary J. Ayles.
Bill of
exceptions No. 5 recites that:
"While
this case was being tried before a jury regularly sworn and
accepted by the state and by the accused, and in the presence
of the jury, and after the state had closed its case in
chief, and after the defense had examined the
better part of its witnesses, and had established some of the
facts contained in the hypothetical question, and expecting
to establish the others (which hypothetical question is
annexed hereto and made part hereof, and was framed by the
accused and to be submitted to Drs. J. A. White and Biscoe,
alienists appointed by the court to examine into the mental
condition of the accused, which appointment is hereto annexed
and made part of this bill), the court in presence of the
jury said that this is not a hypothetical question, and did
not contain facts, and peremptorily refused to permit the
aforesaid Drs. J. A. White and Biscoe to answer the same,
denying the right of the accused to propound or submit said
hypothetical questions to the said alienists, thereby
shutting every avenue of the defense on the question of
insanity out of the case, and causing the jury to find an
unqualified verdict of murder, which would have been
otherwise, had the questions been answered.
"The
court refused to allow the question to be answered for the
following reasons: The question was not a hypothetical one,
but purports to give a statement of facts which were not in
evidence so far as the killing of a woman in New Orleans was
concerned, nor the acts connected therewith. So far as the
court or jury knows, no such facts were in existence.
"A
part of the statement rehearsed the proof that had been
introduced and which was heard by the expert alienist. There
were only two witnesses who testified that the accused acted
queer at times. One of them had been sentenced to the
penitentiary. While there were six or seven witnesses -- some
of the state's witnesses -- who testified that they had
known the accused for two years, and he was of sound mind and
was a successful business man. And the alienists, all after
examination at different times, testified that the accused
was of sound mind and knew well what he was doing; and Dr.
Hayes, in charge of the asylum at Pineville, after
investigation of the accused and his actions, testified that
he was of sound mind and the accused was feigning insanity.
"The
hypothetical question, so called, was, in the opinion of the
court, an effort to set before the jury a statement of
purported facts to influence the minds of the jury. The
accused had a fair and impartial trial by a very intelligent
jury, and the exclusion of the pretended hypothetical
question did not operate to the injury of the accused.
"In
ruling on the hypothetical question, so called, I stated, as
a reason for so doing, it was not one; but it was a statement
made out by the attorney, all of which, so far as the crime
committed by Mary J. Ayles was concerned, had been ruled out
by the court, and there was no comment whatever by the court
on the trial. I was extremely liberal in admitting evidence
in favor of the accused, wishing to give him a fair and
impartial trial, and to prevent, if possible, the reversal of
the verdict of the jury on any technical exception."
The question which is referred to in the bill as the
hypothetical question, and which was annexed to it, was as
follows:
"If,
as bearing on the question of the sanity or insanity of the
accused, Edward Ayles, the following facts were shown by
competent proof in the record and before the court and the
jury who are now trying him on an indictment for murder, it
being charged that he murdered his wife, Mary J. Ayles, on
the night of the 31st of December, 1906, while they were
alone in the rear of the store where he had been for
some months conducting a general secondhand clothing and
furniture store:
"That
on the 1st day of June, 1904, while they were living together
in the city of New Orleans, the said Mary J. Ayles shot and
killed a woman by the name of Alice Wells, whom she surprised
in bed with the said Edward Ayles, and while she was lying
beside him in the bed; that the shock resulting from the
tragedy thereafter caused him to resort to the use of
cocaine, smoking of opium, and drinking whisky in order to
induce forgetfulness of the horror of the frightful scene
through which he had passed; that thereafter they moved, and
lived for a year or more in the Indian Territory, where it
was not possible to prove his acts and conduct, but that
about a year or more before the date of the homicide of which
he is accused they moved to Alexandria, and he opened the
business which is described above, where he kept in different
parts of the premises ready at his hand, and especially at
the head of his bed, while he slept, a Martin and Winchester
rifle, both repeating rifles, and a double-barreled shotgun
and four repeating pistols of the latest improved makes and
pattern, all of said arms loaded to their fullest capacity,
with fixed ammunition; that since the death of said Alice
Wells as above described, when she was shot and killed while
in bed with him by his side, it is shown that all of his
actions have been queer and not those of a normal, sane
person, in the following particulars of conduct and beliefs:
That he was pursued and menaced by enemies who were seeking
to kill him or do him great bodily harm, and that the purpose
of surrounding himself at all times with the abovenamed array
of deadly weapons was to guard and protect himself from these
supposed, and so far as known imaginary, enemies; that on one
occasion shortly before the homicide he mounted a horse
barebacked, with four pistols buckled around him, and went
around the streets of Alexandria in this fashion, collecting
bills with a horsewhip, and did actually beat one person who
owed him 15 cents for not paying him, for all of which he was
arrested; that in the afternoon of the day of the homicide
they had been buggy-riding together; that they had, just
before the homicide, been shooting firecrackers on the
sidewalk; that they had been living happily together; that no
motive has been shown for him to wish to kill her, or harm
her in any way; that after they returned from
the sidewalk almost immediately several shots were fired in
the rear of the store; that when persons came the prisoner
exclaimed several times, 'Oh! I have killed my poor dear
wife accidentally;' that he stated almost immediately to
other persons that the pistols he had were to be used by both
of them at 12 o'clock to celebrate the advent of the New
Year; that while he was handling them they went off of their
own accord in some way for which he could not account, and
his wife had been shot in that manner.
"These
facts being shown satisfactorily, is it your opinion that the
prisoner, at the time of the homicide, was a person of
unsound mind? Is it your opinion that he was, at the time of
the homicide, sane or insane?"
The
other bills of exceptions mentioned are as follows:
Bill of
Exceptions No. 1.
This
bill recites that on the motion to quash this second
indictment, found by a grand jury while a first indictment
was pending for the same crime of murder, the accused
excepted to the ruling of the court overruling the motion to
quash on the ground that the court had held, on the motion
which had been made by him to quash the first indictment
found against him, that that indictment was valid and must
stand; that accused had pleaded to this first indictment, and
his case was fixed for trial; that he had acquired rights
under the first indictment which were beneficial to him,
which neither a subsequent grand jury nor the district
attorney could impair. The court overruled this motion to
quash the second indictment for the following reasons:
"The
district attorney, having some doubts as to the legality of
the first indictment, had the grand jury at this term to find
a new bill, and entered a nolle...
