State v. Crowson

• Decision Date: 12 December 1887
• Citation: 4 S.E. 143,98 N.C. 595
• Parties: STATE v. CROWSON.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

4 S.E. 143

98 N.C. 595

STATE v. CROWSON.

Supreme Court of North Carolina

December 12, 1887

Appeal from superior court, Mitchell county; MACRAE, Judge.

Indictment for murdering a child by drowning. Evidence of a confession made by accused was received at the trial below, when the prisoner was found guilty, and now appeals.

On trial for the murder of a child by drowning, it appeared that the prisoner had been told that she had to tell what she had done with the child, and that, otherwise, they would get after her about it. Evidence was admitted to show that prisoner had then accompanied a deputy sheriff to a stream in which the body was afterwards found, and had said, if any one wanted their negroes drowned, to bring them to her. Held that the confession was made under menace, and was not admissible.

W. B Councill, for appellant.

The Attorney General, for the State.

SMITH C.J.

The prisoner is charged in the indictment with the murder, by drowning, of her infant son of about the age of four years and upon her trial in the superior court of Mitchell, at spring term, 1887, was found by the jury guilty of the crime. The testimony, in substance, was that about the middle of the day, in January, 1887, the prisoner was seen, with her child in her arms, going down the public road, from which, at a point further on, tracks were afterwards found diverging towards the stream in which some days later the dead body was found. She returned the same day, and was at the house of the witness without the child. To an inquiry as to what she had done with it, she replied that she had given it to Mr. Woods whom she saw at Major Keener's with some cattle; that she had taken it down to give to the latter, but it was too small, and he did not want it, and Mr. Woods said he would like it. The prisoner remained that night at the house of the witness, (J. S. McKinney,) and, her mother coming next morning, they left together. The witness met prisoner a short time after, and told her that Mr. Woods did not have the child, and, "if she could not show what she had done with it, they would get after her about it." She then said "that she had not given it to Woods, but to a darkey from Virginia that used to work at Woods'," and that "she did not know the darkey's name." To this testimoney the prisoner's counsel objected, and the objection was overruled, and an exception entered. On the next Sunday, the witness and another, who had been watching the movements of prisoner and her mother, fell in company with two others, Green and Phillips, Green being a deputy of the sheriff, when a conversation again took place about the missing child, when witness said "he told her [the prisoner] she had better show up what she had done with it." Four men besides witness were present. "We told her she had done something with the child, and she had better show up what she had done with it." He further testified as follows: "We told her at last that she had to tell what she had done with the child, and the deputy-sheriff, Green, told her, if she would take him to the place where she had last had the child, he could tell with a crooked stick what she had done with it. Then we told her itwould be best for her to tell what she had done with him;" adding, "Come out and tell the truth about it, and confess it all." To this...