State v. Church

• Decision Date: 08 December 1926
• Docket Number: 482.
• Citation: 135 S.E. 769,192 N.C. 658
• Parties: STATE v. CHURCH.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

135 S.E. 769

192 N.C. 658

STATE v. CHURCH.

No. 482.

Supreme Court of North Carolina

December 8, 1926

Appeal from Superior Court, Catawba County; Siler, Judge.

Stokes Church was convicted of breaking and entering a storehouse with intent to commit larceny, and for larceny, and he appeals. No error.

The defendant and others were prosecuted upon an indictment charging them (1) with unlawfully breaking and entering a storehouse occupied by E. H. Yount & Co., with intent therein to commit larceny; (2) with larceny; (3) with receiving stolen property. He was convicted upon the first and second counts and appealed from the judgment.

A. A Whitener, Louie A. Whitener, and T. Manly Whitener, all of Hickory, and Jesse C. Sigmon, of Newton, for appellant.

Dennis G. Brummitt, Atty. Gen., and Frank Nash, Asst. Atty. Gen for the State.

ADAMS J.

The storehouse was entered and the larceny was committed on June 2, 1926, at night, and two days later the chief of police in Granite Falls saw the defendant and Charlie Craven walking down a railroad track in Burke county. Each of them carried a suit case containing a part of the stolen property. When the officer called to them to stop, Craven ran, jumped into the river, and escaped; the defendant was arrested and imprisoned, and was afterwards tried and convicted.

Upon the trial, the defendant attempted to set up an alibi, and his testimony was corroborated by that of other witnesses. He now contends-the evidence was circumstantial-that he was convicted for the reason that he happened to be found in company with Craven. His explanation is that he carried the suit case for Craven, and, in his examination as a witness he gave his reason for doing so, and insisted that he had not previously been with Craven or with any of the codefendants. He offered to show, by the cross-examination of the chief of police and by his own testimony, that Craven, as he ran away to escape arrest, said that he was the owner of the two suit cases and the clothing they contained, and that the defendant had no knowledge of their contents. The proposed testimony was excluded, and the defendant excepted.

There was no error in the exclusion of this evidence. A confession made, not by the defendant, but by a third person, is not admissible. While authority favorable to the admission of such evidence is not altogether wanting, most of the American courts exclude statements of this character. With us the principle may be regarded as definitely established. In State v. Daniel May, 15 N.C. 328, the defendant offered in evidence the confession of William May that he alone was guilty of the crime for which Daniel was prosecuted. In rejecting this evidence, Chief Justice Ruffin said:

"Except the facts of the respective residences of the parties, which of themselves do not tend to establish guilt in either of the parties, it is obvious that all the evidence, as well that received as that rejected, consists of the acts and declarations of other persons, to which neither the state nor the prisoner is privy. I think the whole of it was inadmissible. The confession is plainly so. It is mere hearsay. It may seem absurd to one not accustomed to compare proofs, and estimate the weight of testimony according to the tests of veracity within our power, that an unbiased confession of one man that he is guilty of an offense with which another is charged, should not establish the guilt of him who confesses it, and by

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