State v. Dooley

• Decision Date: 16 January 1894
• Citation: 57 N.W. 414,89 Iowa 584
• Parties: STATE v. DOOLEY.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

89 Iowa 584

57 N.W. 414

STATE

v.DOOLEY.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Jan. 16, 1894.

Appeal from district court, Adams county; H. M. Towner, Judge.

Defendant was charged by indictment with the crime of murder, was tried by jury, found guilty of murder in the first degree, and the punishment designated in the verdict was death. From the judgment rendered on the verdict, fixing the date of his execution on the 16th day of June, 1893, the defendant appeals.Dale & Brown, for appellant.

John Y. Stone, Atty. Gen., and Thos. A. Cheshire, for the State.

ROBINSON, J.

At about 7 o'clock in the morning of May 11, 1892, W. H. Coons went from his home, which was between half and three–quarters of a mile southwest of the town of Prescott, leaving there his wife, Lucinda; his daughter, Nellie, 10 years of age; and his nephew, the defendant, 16 years of age. At 5 o'clock in the afternoon of the next day, he returned, and found the house closed and locked. He succeeded in entering it, and found lying on a bed the lifeless bodies of his wife and daughter. They had been murdered, and appearances indicated that they had been dead for from 24 to 36 hours when their bodies were found. The underclothing of the mother was in such disorder as to indicate that an assault before the murder may have been attempted. The nephew was absent, and had taken a team, buggy, and some clothing, and other articles, which he did not own. Late in the evening of the 12th day of May, he was arrested in Villisca. His indictment and conviction were for the murder of his cousin, Nellie Coons.

1. Section 2 of chapter 165 of the Acts of the 17th General Assembly, as amended by section 2 of chapter 2 of the Acts of the 18th General Assembly, contains the following: “Upon the trial of an indictment for murder the jury, if they find the defendant guilty of murder in the first degree, must designate in their verdict whether he shall be punished by death or imprisonment for life at hard labor in the penitentiary.” During the impaneling of the trial jury the state was permitted to ask certain persons, who were retained as members of the jury, whether they had any conscientious scruples against the infliction of the death penalty. The defendant objected to the questions as “incompetent, immaterial, and irrelevant, and not a statutory ground for challenge.” The objections were overruled, and of that ruling the appellant complains. The questions were not allowed on the theory that the answers might disclose ground for challenge for cause; and much that is said in argument, and most of the authorities cited by appellant on that point, are wholly irrelevant to the question presented. He does not deny that peremptory challenge may be made by the state and by the defendant without the assignment of any cause, but insists that the right to examine persons called to act as jurors in regard to their qualifications is limited to the statutory grounds for challenges for cause. Section 4407 of the Code, relied upon by appellant to sustain his claims, is as follows: “4407. Upon the trial of a challenge to an individual juror, the juror challenged may be examined as a witness, to prove or disprove the challenge, and must answer every question pertinent to the inquiry thereon, but his answers shall not afterwards be testimony against him.” That section refers exclusively to challenges for cause, and has no relation to peremptory challenges. It is the general and well–established practice to allow both to the state and to the defendant considerable latitude in the examination of persons called to act as jurors, not only to facilitate the discovery of grounds for challenge for cause, but to enable the parties interested to discover any peculiarity of conduct, association, character, or opinion, or any predilection, of the person under examination, or other circumstances which, in the opinion of the examiner, might influence the person as a juror, and affect his verdict. It is well known to persons familiar with jury trials that jurors are frequently influenced in reaching a verdict by considerations which have no legitimate application in the case. The right of peremptory challenge gives the means of keeping from the jury persons of that kind, which the challenge for cause does not afford; and parties should be permitted to examine persons called to act as jurors, within reasonable limits, to the end that the peremptory challenges may be used intelligently. It was the privilege of the state to exclude from the jury, so far as its right to peremptory challenges extended, all persons who were prejudiced against the infliction of the death penalty; and it was not an abuse of the right of examination to permit inquiry as to the views of the persons summoned as jurors, on that point. The objections to questions under consideration were therefore properly overruled.

2. Appellant complains that the state was permitted to prove, not only the condition in which the body of Nellie Coons was found, but also the condition of the body of her mother, and of the clothing upon it, on the ground that the effect of permitting such evidence to be introduced was to put him upon trial for an assault upon the mother, and the murder of both the mother and child. We do not think the complaint is well founded. The state was entitled to show the condition in which the body of the child was found, and its surroundings, and, incidentally, that of the mother, in order that the connection of the defendant with the crime of which he was accused, the circumstances under which it was committed, and the motives which prompted it, might be more fully understood; and the fact that, in proving those matters, another crime would necessarily be shown, did not affect the right of the state to introduce the evidence in question.

3. The evidence shows that there were two wounds on the head of Nellie Coons,––one on the back of it, caused by a blow with some instrument, and a pistol–shot wound in the forehead,––and that the latter probably caused her death. The appellant contends that the indictment does not sufficiently charge murder in the first degree, committed by the pistol shot, in that it does not allege that the shot was fired willfully, and with deliberation, premeditation, malice aforethought, and intent to kill. The indictment contains two counts. The first one charges that defendant, at the time and place stated, “in and upon the body of one Nellie Coons, then and there...