State v. Carleton

• Full Citation: State v. Carleton, 92 A.2d 327, 148 Me. 237 (Me. 1952)
• Decision Date: 28 October 1952
• Citation: 92 A.2d 327,148 Me. 237
• Parties: STATE v. CARLETON et al.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 327

92 A.2d 327

148 Me. 237

STATE v. CARLETON et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Oct. 28, 1952.

Curtis M. Payson, County Atty., Rockland, for the State.

George W. Wood Jr., Rockland, for Stanley & Raymond Carleton.

A. Alan Grossman, Rockland, for Willard Carleton.

Before THAXTER, FELLOWS, MERRILL, NULTY and WILLIAMSON, JJ.

NULTY, Justice.

This case comes before us on respondents' bill of exceptions from the November 1951 Term of the Knox County Superior Court. The three Carletons named above were indicted, with one George Johnson who did not stand trial, at said term on the charge of breaking, entering and larceny and at the trial at said term were found guilty. During the course of the trial the respondents excepted to the introduction of certain evidence in the nature of admissions made by the respondents to the sheriff of the County and also to the admission in evidence of what is usually termed an extrajudicial confession in writing of one of the respondents, namely, Stanley Carleton. The evidence introduced by the State, which was very brief, consisted of testimony by one George Butler who was the owner of a farm in Union, Maine, in said County of Knox, and after the usual preliminary questions which proved that a barn was located on his farm and that on the date in question, December 3, 1950, he owned certain live stock in the barn. The evidence also proved that Mr. Butler did not live on his farm because his dwelling house had been destroyed by fire and that he was living in Union about two miles from his farm and that on the morning of December 3rd he went to his barn to tend his stock and he discovered that a holstein heifer ten months of age of the value of $110 was missing and that he has never recovered the heifer or found her. He further testified on redirect examination that the barn doors were not locked because there was no padlock but that they were closed and were closed when he came to his barn on the morning of said December 3, 1950. The only other witness for the State was the sheriff of the County, Willard Pease, who stated that he received a complaint from Mr. Butler and that he, in company with a deputy sheriff, went, on December 3, 1950, to the barn of George Butler and made an investigation. He found the ground frozen and no car tracks or finger prints. He further testified that in September of the year 1951, while conducting another investigation, he interrogated the respondents and that after advising them of their constitutional rights he asked them certain questions in regard to the heifer alleged to have belonged to Mr. Butler. At this point the respondents objected to the introduction of any further testimony by way of statements or admissions of the respondents on the ground that until the corpus delicti had been sufficiently proved by either circumstantial or direct evidence, the statements or admissions were not admissible. The court, however, permitted the witness to testify as to the statements or admissions which the respondent, Stanley Carleton, made to him as a result of the questioning and also permitted, over objection of the respondents, the introduction of the confession in writing of Stanley Carleton. The witness was likewise permitted, over objection, to testify as to the statements or admissions which both Willard Carleton and Raymond Carleton, Jr. made to him with respect to the events which happened on the night of December 3, 1950. The statements and written confession would tend to prove, if legally admissible, that the respondents went to the barn of Mr. Butler on the night of December 3, 1950, in the early morning hours and, after entering the barn, took the heifer from the barn, shot it and took it to a house where they dressed the animal, removed the hide and the entrails, and disposed of the hide and entrails by throwing the same into a river at Thomaston and subsequently participated in eating, at various times, the meat. At the conclusion of the State's case the respondents moved for a directed verdict which motion was denied and exceptions allowed. A blanket exception was also taken to the charge of the presiding justice which under the authority of McKown v. Powers, 86 Me. 291, 296, 29 A. 1079, is ineffectual and cannot be considered. We therefore, have before us two exceptions, one to the admission of the statements or admissions of the respondents together with the admission of the extrajudicial confession of said Stanley Carleton made to the sheriff, the other, the denial of the motion for a directed verdict. The exceptions, whether considered together or separately, raise the same question of law, that is, whether there was sufficient proof of the corpus delicti so that the extrajudicial confession of one of the respondents or the admissions of the respondents were admissible in evidence to corroborate the corpus delicti. In recent months we have considered the subject of corpus delicti in two cases, State v. Levesque, 146 Me. 351, 81 A.2d 665, and State v. Hoffses, 147 Me. 221, 85 A.2d 919. In the Levesque case it was determined that there was no proof...