State v. Detar

• Decision Date: 11 February 1928
• Docket Number: 27,838
• Citation: State v. Detar, 125 Kan. 218, 263 P. 1071 (Kan. 1928)
• Parties: THE STATE OF KANSAS, Appellee, v. DELOS DETAR, Appellant
• Court: Kansas Supreme Court

263 P. 1071

125 Kan. 218

THE STATE OF KANSAS, Appellee, v. DELOS DETAR, Appellant

No. 27,838

Supreme Court of Kansas

February 11, 1928

Decided January, 1928

Appeal from Reno district court; WILLIAM G. FAIRCHILD, judge.

Judgment reversed and cause remanded.

SYLLABUS

SYLLABUS BY THE COURT.

1. CRIMINAL LAW -- Separate Trial of Issue of Insanity -- Duty to Make Preliminary Investigation Before Proceeding With Trial. The defendant was charged with a felony, and in the process of impaneling a jury to try him questions were asked by his counsel implying that the defendant was insane at the time, and thereupon counsel for the state presented a motion for a preliminary investigation as to present insanity stating that it had been brought to the attention of the court that the defendant was insane at that time, by the questions asked by defendant's counsel, and also by the demeanor of defendant in court. The court overruled the motion and proceeded with the trial on the merits, in which much evidence of expert witnesses as well as of nonexperts was given, to the effect that the defendant was then insane. Held, that it was the duty of the court to make a preliminary investigation whether the defendant was incapable of comprehending his position and to make his defense before proceeding further with the trial of the case on the merits.

2. SAME--Preliminary Investigation of Insanity-- Formal Application Unnecessary. A formal application by the parties, or either of them, for such an inquiry is not essential to ordering it to be held where it is otherwise brought to the attention of the court, and where the court learns from observation, reasonable claim or credible source, that there is doubt of defendant's mental capacity to comprehend his position and to make his defense.

J. N. Tincher, Don Shaffer, Mabel Jones Shaffer, Rubert G. Martin, all of Hutchinson, and A. L. Moffat, of Kinsley, for the appellant.

William A. Smith, attorney-general, Roland Boynton, assistant attorney-general, Charles Hall, county attorney, and John Fontron, assistant county attorney, for the appellee; J. R. Beeching, of Hutchinson, of counsel.

OPINION

JOHNSTON, C. J.:

In an information Delos Detar was charged with assault upon J. E. Eaton, an assistant cashier of a bank, with a deadly weapon, and in a second count he was charged with felonious entry of the bank with intent to rob. Under the first count he was convicted of simple assault, and on the second count of bank robbery. The question of his sanity was raised at the opening of the case, and in the course of the trial four physicians who were called testified that they had known the defendant for years and that he had been and was of unsound mind, that he was insane at that time, and in his mental state was unaccountable and could not distinguish right from wrong. His father, who is also a doctor, testified to a number of things proposed and done by the defendant which tended to show irresponsibility and insanity. He stated that his present mental condition was due to an injury he had sustained in 1925 when there was an explosion of an air tank which hurled him six or eight feet against metal obstructions, that his left arm was blown off and his body lacerated, and that since that time he has been more or less irresponsible, and is now insane. Other witnesses who were not physicians and who knew the defendant testified that from his manner and actions they regarded him to be insane. Several witnesses produced by the state who had seen and talked with defendant about the time the offense was committed, stated that they believed him to be sane.

The principal question presented here is whether a sufficient claim was made of the mental disability of the defendant which rendered him unfit to answer the charge and make a defense. It appears that in the impaneling of the jury the attorneys for the defendant asked questions implying that the defendant had been and is insane, and inquiring as to the attitude of the jurors where that question was involved. After that course had been pursued for some time, and before the jury had been sworn to try the case, the following motion was made by the prosecution:

"Comes now the state of Kansas and makes application to the court that the court appoint a tribunal such as provided by statute, either to sit as a jury or commission to inquire into the sanity or insanity of the defendant as of the present time, for the reason and upon the grounds that it has been brought to the court's attention that the defendant's sanity or insanity is in question as of this time by the manner and form of the questions asked by the defendant's counsel in the examination of the jurors, and by reason of the defendant's demeanor while in the court room, sitting with head bowed down and taking no apparent interest in the trial."

The jury was excused for a time, and the court, after hearing arguments on the motion, overruled it and directed counsel to proceed with the trial on the merits. The matter of whether the defendant was insane at the time of the trial and mentally capable of making a defense was brought to the attention of the court and furnished sufficient grounds for a preliminary inquiry on the question before proceeding with the trial on the merits. When that question is raised and there are grounds for...