State v. Harrold
| Decision Date | 31 October 1866 |
| Parties | STATE OF MISSOURI, Respondent, v. GEORGE HARROLD, Appellant. |
| Court | Missouri Supreme Court |
Appeal from St. Charles Circuit Court.
R. L. Farnsworth, D. D. Fisher and E. W. Ewing, for appellant.
Orrick and Dyer, for respondent.
The appellant was indicted for burglary and larceny in the Montgomery Circuit Court, and at his instance a change of venue was granted to St. Charles county. On a trial in the St. Charles Circuit Court he was convicted and sentenced to the penitentiary, and he has appealed from the judgment to this court. The admission of illegal evidence, and the giving of improper instructions for the State, and the refusal to give proper instructions for the appellant, are alleged as grounds against the conviction and in support of a reversal of the judgment.
The evidence against the accused was wholly circumstantial, and consisted, among other things, of tracking four men (there being a slight snow on the ground) from the place where the burglary and larceny was committed to the house of one Spartan Mansfield, where the prisoner and three other men, who are all jointly indicted, were found. No other person at that time was on the premises. The search was made and prosecuted the next morning after the offence took place, and on the premises were found a part of the articles stolen from the house at the time of the burglary.
On instituting a further examination, a lot of burglars' tools were found secreted in a stable a short distance from the house, and at another place divers other articles not mentioned in the indictment. The prisoner objected to all testimony regarding the burglars' tools and the other articles not named in the indictment, but the court overruled the objection and admitted the evidence.
The case of the State v. Wolf, 15 Mo. 168, much relied on by the counsel for the appellant, has very slight if any application to the case at bar. That was an indictment for larceny, and the attempt was made to fasten guilt upon the accused by the fact of possession, when the truth was that the stolen property was found on the premises where he was merely employed as a laborer. And the court rightfully held, that when various articles of property other than those mentioned in the indictment are found in the defendant's possession, there may be some pretext for proving them to be stolen in order to fix a guilty knowledge on him; but when the things stolen were found in the possession of another, with whom the defendant had been living a short time as a hired hand, such evidence is not admissible. As a general rule it is not permissible to show that the accused has committed other crimes of the same kind as the one for which he is being tried; as for example, if he is being tried for larceny, to show that he has committed, at other times and places, other and disconnected larcenies; or for riot, to show that he has been engaged in other riots; or for the murder of a particular person by poison, to show the poisoning of another at another time and place--State v. Goetz, 34 Mo. 85; 1 Bish. Crim. Proc. § 490, and authorities cited. But the doctrine thus stated and laid down is not carried so far as to exclude evidence which has a direct tendency to prove the particular crime for which the prisoner stands indicted. If the evidence offered has this direct tendency, it is to be received, though it also tends to prove the commission of another, separate, and distinct offence--1 Bish. Crim. Proc. § 491; Stout v. People, 4 Parker C. C. 71, 132; Heath v. Commonwealth, 1 Rob. (Va.) 735; Higgins v. The State, 7 Ind. 549; Haskins v. People, 16 N. Y. 344; Burr v. Commonwealth, 4 Grat. 534; Rex. v. Long, 6 Carr. & P. 179.
The evidence adduced on the trial, of the finding of the burglarious implements and the other goods not mentioned in the indictment, was not offered for the purpose of showing the prisoner guilty of another and separate offence, whatever tendency it might have had that way. The prisoner stood charged with burglary and larceny; immediately after the commission of the crime four men were tracked in the snow to a certain house, where four men were found, the prisoner among the number; the fruits of the crime were found on the premises together with the burglarious instruments; the whole formed a part of the history of the transaction, and as such was admissible for the consideration of the jury.
The instructions will now be briefly noticed. The court of its own motion gave five instructions. The first is in the usual form, instructing the jury “that if they believe from the evidence in the case,” &c. The...
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