State v. Hauptmann

• Decision Date: 09 October 1935
• Docket Number: No. 99.,99.
• Citation: 180 A. 809
• Parties: STATE v. HAUPTMANN.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

180 A. 809

STATE

v. HAUPTMANN.

No. 99.

Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey.

Oct. 9, 1935.

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Syllabus by the Court.

1. The summing up for the state at the trial of this case held not to be such as to bar application of the rule that, in the absence of objection and motion to expunge offensive matter, no ground for review is created.

2. The cross-examination of defendant similarly held not to amount to legal error, in the absence of objection.

3. Variance in the theory of the details of the crime between the opening and closing of the state's case held not harmful to defendant, as the case was submitted by the court to the jury on the former theory alone, and the defense on the facts being an alibi.

4. Claim of the violation of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution held to be without merit.

5. There being evidence to show that a fatal stroke was inflicted in Hunterdon county, the indictment was properly found, and trial had, in that county, even though death may have occurred in another county.

6. A charge basing guilt of murder in the first degree on elements including those of common-law burglary, in the course of which the homicide was committed, held not erroneous, though referring to a statute also including the elements of common-law burglary without mentioning that crime in the text thereof.

7. The stealing of a child and its nightdress from its home, followed by the surrender of the nightdress merely as proof that the kidnapper had the child and to induce negotiations for its ransom, held to be indicative of an intent to commit larceny and to constitute that crime.

8. Evidence held to justify the jury in finding that the burglary, if committed, was not complete at the time of the homicide.

9. Murder may be committed in the perpetration of a burglary, though the burglary, as such, may be complete for purposes of prosecution, if the homicide be committed within the res gestæ of the felony.

10. It is always the right and often the duty of a trial judge to comment on the evidence, and give the jury his impressions of its weight and value, and such comment is not assignable for error so long as the ultimate decision on disputed facts is plainly left to the jury.

11. The charge on circumstantial evidence held free from error when read in its entirety.

12. The court properly refused to charge that the opinion of experts in handwriting, based on mere comparison, "* * * must be esteemed proof of low degree."

Other requests on the first point also held properly refused, and the comments of the court on the expert evidence held proper.

13. Charge on reasonable doubt held free from error.

14. Other requests to charge held properly refused as unfounded in law or not justified by the evidence.

15. The testimony of the witness Tartell was properly excluded, as not proper impeachment of other testimony.

16. Objection to Kelly testimony as a conclusion held ill founded. Motion to strike out Maish testimony on the following day, after the witness had returned to Ohio, held too late.

17. The ladder was properly admitted in evidence.

18. Verdict not against weight of evidence.

19. No legal error arose from (a) presence of dead child's father in court, (b) or of "other prominent persons not connected with the case," (c) or from demonstrations of laughter or applause by spectators, rebuked by the court, (d) or from the movements of messengers and clerks, (e) or from press reports and radio broadcasts—particularly in the absence of objection during the trial.

20. The arrangements for care and sequestration of the jury were reasonably adequate.

21. It was not error (a) to let the jury use a magnifying glass, or (b) to furnish them food under the direction of the court, or (e) to advise them in the evening that the judge was going home for the night at a stated hour.

Error to Court of Oyer and Terminer, Hunterdon County.

Bruno Richard Hauptmann was convicted of murder in the first degree without recommendation of life imprisonment, and he brings error.

Affirmed.

Egbert Rosecrans,, of Blairstown, and Frederick A. Pope, of Somerville, for plaintiff in error.

David T. Wilentz, Atty. Gen. (Joseph Lanigan and Robert Peacock, Asst. Attys. Gen., and Anthony M. Hauck, Jr., of Clinton, Prosecutor of the Pleas, on the brief), for the State.

PARKER, Justice.

The plaintiff in error was indicted for murder by the grand jury of Hunterdon county, was tried in that county, and convicted of murder in the first degree without recommendation of life imprisonment, and brings this writ of error.

The victim of the alleged murder was Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr., a child less than two years old on March 1, 1932, the date laid in the indictment. On that evening, according to the testimony, the child was put to bed about 8 o'clock, and was left asleep in the house of his parents at East Amwell in the county of Hunterdon. About 10 o'clock, when the nurse returned to the room, the child was missing, and indications detailed in the evidence pointed to a kidnapping. On the windowsill was a letter testified to be in the handwriting of the defendant, demanding $50,000 ransom and signifying that later instructions as to method of payment would be forthcoming. This led to negotiations, in the course of which a number of other notes were received; and on the evening of April 2 Dr. Condon, an agent of Col. Lindbergh, the father, met a man, who, as the state claimed and he testified, was the defendant, at a cemetery in the Bronx, the money was paid in bills capable of later identification, the parents having already received, as proof that the kidnapper had the child, a little sleeping suit which the child had on at the time of the kidnapping, and which figured as an important piece of evidence. The baby himself was never returned, and, as shown to the satisfaction of the jury by the evidence, had long been dead. His mutilated and decomposed body was accidentally discovered on May 12 in a shallow grave several miles away in the adjoining county of Mercer. The state claimed, and evidence supported the claim, that the autopsy disclosed the baby had suffered three violent fractures of the skull and that death was instantaneous.

As the result of investigations continued over many months, the detective and prosecuting authorities procured the arrest of the defendant, a resident of the Bronx, on a charge of murder. He resisted extradition, but was ultimately surrendered by the New York state authorities. The present indictment was returned on October 8, 1934, and the trial began January 2, 1935, and continued until February 13, 1935, on which day defendant was found guilty as above stated, and sentenced to suffer the death penalty. Argument on the writ of error was deferred until June 20 at the special request of counsel for the plaintiff in error, and to afford them time to procure the printing of the ten-volume state of the case. It is not necessary at this point to go into an extended discussion of the evidence. Certain special features of it will be considered in connection with the several points made for reversal and particularly in connection with weight of evidence. It is proper to note, however, as a matter of common knowledge, the existence of great popular excitement before and throughout the trial, and of a crowded courtroom at all stages of the case.

The case is brought up both on bill of exceptions and on a certificate of the entire record of proceedings at the trial pursuant to section 136 of the Criminal Procedure Act, 2 Comp. St. 1910, p. 1863. The assignments of error are arranged in groups A to R, inclusive; the causes for reversal under the additional statutory review run similarly from A to V. They are not identical throughout. The fundamental inquiry, in the language of the cited statute, is whether defendant on the trial "suffered manifest wrong and injury, either in the admission or rejection of testimony * * * or in the charge of the court, or in the denial of any matter by the court which was a matter of discretion * * * provided, no judgment * * * shall be reversed for any * * * error except such as shall or may have prejudiced the defendant in maintaining his defense upon the merits."

As to the corpus deliciti, little or no question was raised. The identity of the dead child was expressly admitted. The question whether an indictment would lie in Hunterdon was vigorously argued. Apart from this, the main contest was over the question whether defendant was the guilty man, the state claiming that he was, and he claiming the contrary, that he was never at the place of the crime, knew nothing about it, and had nothing to do with it. Certain questions of law were argued below and again in this court. The brief for plaintiff in error, which was followed at the argument, presented the case under sixteen points, grouping assignments of error and causes for reversal where they are cognate; and these points will be considered in the order appearing on the brief.

Point I is that "the summation of the attorney general violated the legal and constitutional rights of the defendant."

As may be surmised, the summation on both sides was lengthy. That by Mr. Reilly, of the New York bar, for the defense, covers 100 pages of the printed case; that by the Attorney General, 135 pages. From this latter counsel for plaintiff in error have extracted a number of passages, which, as they claim, amounted to illegal and unconstitutional abuse of the rights and privileges of an arguing advocate, and charge error on the part of the trial judge in failing to intervene and restrict the speaker to his legitimate line of argument. Some are expressive of a belief in defendant's guilt on the part of prosecuting officers; some are vituperative characterizations of defendant, given his guilt. One or more intimate that the...