State v. Campbell

Citation82 Conn. 671,74 A. 927
PartiesSTATE v. CAMPBELL.
Decision Date06 January 1910
CourtConnecticut Supreme Court

Appeal from Superior Court, New Haven County; Edwin B. Gager, Judge.

Samuel E. Campbell was convicted of manslaughter, and he appeals. No error.

Jacob P. Goodhart and Robert C. Stoddard, for appellant. Arnon A. Ailing, State's Atty., and Walter M. Pickett, for the State.

HALL, J. The Information alleges that on the 14th of November, 1908, the defendant with force and arms willfully and feloniously made an assault upon one George P. Morgan, of New Haven, and willfully and feloniously forced, drove, and propelled upon and against him a certain motor vehicle, which the defendant was propelling in the highway of said town, at an unlawful, high, and dangerous rate of speed, and in an improper, reckless, and negligent manner, and thereby so wounded and injured the said Morgan that he died on the following day, and that the accused did thereby feloniously and willfully kill and slay the said Morgan. These averments charge the common-law crime of involuntary manslaughter by culpable negligence while engaged in a lawful act. In support of this charge the state claimed to have proved that early in the afternoon of November 14, 1908, the accused, who had for a long time been engaged in the automobile business, while driving, in company with two other persons, an automobile known as a "Rambler Touring Car," and weighing 3,000 pounds, and while going in a southeasterly direction, from Goffe street towards York street, upon Broadway, a much-traveled business street in the city of New Haven, at an excessive rate of speed, and at a rate greatly in excess of 10 miles an hour, ran his car upon the deceased, Rev. George B. Morgan of New Haven, as the said Morgan was crossing Broadway in an easterly direction, and so injured him that he died the following day.

The finding states that it appeared at the trial from the testimony of the defendant that he saw Mr. Morgan, either on the curb, or just as Mr. Morgan was leaving it to cross the roadway, and that for that reason, and because the defendant was approaching the crossing, he sounded his automobile horn. The state claimed to have shown that when the horn was blown, the accused jumped as though startled or frightened, and ran in the same diagonal direction across the street as he had been going; that thereupon, when he saw Morgan increasing his speed, as he ran in front of him, as if intending to cross the street ahead of the automobile, the defendant turned his automobile slightly to the left, without attempting to stop it, and without diminishing its speed, so that the deceased and the automobile were apparently both directing their courses toward the same point on the easterly side of Broadway, each endeavoring to pass ahead of the other. The result was, as the state claimed, that the automobile was driven violently against the deceased, the forward part of the right rear wheel and the mudguard, striking him and throwing him into the air to the height of the tonneau of the car, and causing him to so fall upon the back of his head that his skull was thereby fractured.

The defendant claimed to have proved that at no time was he driving his car at a fast rate of speed, nor faster than 10 or 12 miles an hour; that when he arrived within about 35 feet of where Mr. Morgan was standing, he saw him in a safe position on, or just off, the sidewalk; that the accused blew his automobile horn, and continued on in a straight line until he came substantially abreast of Mr. Morgan and to a point where he passed out of the range of the defendant's vision, when suddenly Mr. Morgan started diagonally across Broadway, running very fast, with his body bent forward and his head turned a little to the south; that when the accused saw him running in that manner he turned his machine quickly to the left to avoid him, and did all in his power to avoid him; that he could not have stopped his automobile in less than 15 or 18 feet; and that if he had applied the brakes, Mr. Morgan would still have collided with the machine, but further forward than he did.

The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and the court sentenced the accused to be confined at hard labor in the common jail for the term of 10 months.

The 35 assigned reasons of appeal to this court relate to alleged refusals of the trial judge to charge the jury, as requested by the defendant, to stated portions of the charge given, and to numerous rulings upon questions of evidence. There are 5 of the 15 requests to charge which it is said the court erroneously refused, namely, those numbered from 8 to 12. The eighth and ninth were substantially complied with.

The tenth was, in substance, that the state must prove that Mr. Morgan's own negligence was not the proximate cause of the injury. The rule of law concerning the contributory negligence by the injured person as a defense in civil actions for damages for personal injuries had no application to this case. The state was required to prove the alleged unlawful act of the accused and its consequences, but not that the deceased exercised due care to avoid the consequences of that unlawful act. The court did not, either by its refusal to charge as thus requested, or by the language used, give the jury to understand, as the defendant claims he did, that the conduct of the deceased was eliminated from the case. The court properly said to the jury that the state must clearly show that the deceased's death was the direct result of the defendant's negligence, but that the injured man's conduct became material only as it bore upon the question of such negligence of the accused, and that if the culpable negligence of the accused was the cause of Mr. Morgan's death, the accused was responsible under the criminal law whether Mr. Morgan's failure to use due care contributed to his injury or not.

By the eleventh and twelfth requests the court was asked to tell the jury that the accused had the right to assume that Mr. Morgan would use reasonable care to avoid danger, and that the accused was not chargeable with extra care until he saw that Mr. Morgan was putting himself needlessly and negligently in a place of danger, and that if the accused took such steps as, at the time, seemed to him most expedient to avoid the accident, he should be acquitted. What the accused, under the circumstances in which he was placed, might reasonably have assumed would be the conduct of the deceased, and...

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75 cases
  • State v. Gee, 5286
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court of Idaho
    • February 3, 1930
    ......In general,. contributory negligence is not a defense in a criminal. prosecution. ( Maxon v. State, 177 Wis. 379, 21 A. L. R. 1484, 187 N.W. 753; Keller v. State, 155 Tenn. 633, 59 A. L. R. 685, 299 S.W. 803; People v. Rewland, 335 Ill. 432, 167 N.E. 10; State v. Campbell, 82 Conn. 671, 135 Am. St. 293, 18 Ann. Cas. 236, 74 A. 927.). . . Defendant's. proposed instruction in the language of the act, that no car. shall be parked within twenty-five feet from the intersection. of curb lines, etc., at an intersection of highways (Sess. Laws 1927, ......
  • State v. Munoz, 15121
    • United States
    • Supreme Court of Connecticut
    • May 9, 1995
    .......         "It was the state's burden to prove that a proximate cause of the death was the unlawful acts of the defendants or of either of them. State v. Leopold, [supra, 110 Conn. at 62, 147 A. 118]; State v. Campbell, [82 Conn. 671, 675, 74 A. 927 (1910) ]. Consequently, under the circumstances of this accident, only if the conduct of the driver of the DeSanty car was shown to be the independent and efficient cause of his father's death would the state fail to meet its burden. If, however, the requisite ......
  • People v. Maki
    • United States
    • Supreme Court of Michigan
    • January 7, 1929
    ...charge of negligent homicide is not well founded. People v. Campbell, 237 Mich. 424, 212 N. W. 97;State v. Campbell, 82 Conn. 671, 74 A. 927,135 Am. St. Rep. 293,18 Ann. Cas. 236. Other errors are assigned in the record, but they are not likely to arise incident to a retrial of the case and......
  • State v. Bunkley
    • United States
    • Supreme Court of Connecticut
    • March 24, 1987
    ...statute. See State v. Block, 87 Conn. 573, 89 A. 167 (1913); State v. Goetz, 83 Conn. 437, 76 A. 1000 (1910); State v. Campbell, 82 Conn. 671, 74 A. 927 (1910). Frequently, these various degrees of negligence eluded exact definition and often were used interchangeably. See, e.g., State v. C......
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