State v. Hix

• Decision Date: 21 April 1938
• Docket Number: 6531
• Citation: 58 Idaho 730,78 P.2d 1003
• Parties: STATE, Respondent, v. WILLIAM HIX, Appellant
• Court: Idaho Supreme Court

78 P.2d 1003

58 Idaho 730

STATE, Respondent, v. WILLIAM HIX, Appellant

No. 6531

Supreme Court of Idaho

April 21, 1938

CRIMINAL LAW-MURDER-CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE-INSTRUCTIONS-DEGREES OF MURDER-ONE OF FOUR VERDICTS.

1. "Circumstantial evidence" differs from "direct evidence," in that the facts which go to make up circumstances from which a logical conclusion follows that one is guilty of certain acts do not in themselves constitute either direct or positive evidence of the main fact of whether accused committed the act charged.

2. Circumstantial evidence fails if it comes from a source unworthy of belief or if premises cannot support the needed conclusion.

3. In prosecution for murder in the first degree, refusal to give instruction that one of four verdicts, including verdict of not guilty, verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree, guilty of murder in the second degree, guilty of manslaughter, could be rendered under the information, was error, since offense of murder in the first degree includes the lesser offenses of second-degree murder and manslaughter. (I. C. A., sec. 19-2211, and sec. 17-1103, as amended by Sess. Laws, 1933, chap. 24.)

4. In prosecution for murder in the first degree, instruction limiting verdict to verdict of not guilty or guilty of murder of first degree was erroneous, since offense of murder in the first degree necessarily includes offenses of second-degree murder and manslaughter. (I. C. A., sec. 19-2211, and sec 17-1103, as amended by Sess. Laws, 1933, chap. 24.)

5. Charge of murder necessarily includes the offense of murder in the first degree, murder in the second degree, and manslaughter, and to refuse to give an instruction embodying degrees of crime in murder prosecution is a denial to accused of fair and impartial trial. (I. C. A., sec. 19-2211, and sec. 17-1103, as amended by Sess. Laws, 1933, chap. 24.)

6. Doubts and uncertainties as to the view the jury may take of a case render it imperative that a trial court follow the statutes and establish rules of substantive law in advising jury as to their duties in arriving at a verdict.

7. An instruction defining circumstantial evidence and stating that, if the facts and circumstances shown by evidence were sufficient to satisfy jury beyond a reasonable doubt of accused's guilt, evidence was sufficient to warrant a conviction "though part or all of such evidence" was circumstantial, was misleading as having a tendency to confuse the meaning of reasonable doubt and in use of the quoted phrase as erroneously leading jury to believe that the court thought that there was direct evidence somewhere in the case tending to establish the state's contention.

8. The court should not enter into discussion as to the weight of any specific class of evidence or the effect which should be given to the evidence by the jury as compared with any other class of evidence, although it is proper for counsel to argue whether the evidence is sufficiently strong when circumstantial to authorize a conviction.

9. The refusal in murder prosecution of a requested instruction that before accused could be found guilty of crime charged, based solely on circumstantial evidence, jury must find beyond a reasonable doubt that circumstances were consistent with guilt of defendant and inconsistent with innocence and incapable of explanation on any other reasonable hypothesis than that of guilty, was error.

10. The refusal in a murder prosecution of requested instructions that, where the evidence could be reconciled either with theory of innocence or of guilt, law requires that jury adopt theory of innocence, was error.

11. To sustain a conviction based solely on circumstantial evidence circumstances must be consistent with guilt of defendant and inconsistent with his innocence and incapable of explanation on any other reasonable hypothesis than that of guilt.

12. If circumstantial evidence can be reconciled either with theory of innocence or guilt, law requires theory of innocence be adopted.

13. An instruction on circumstantial evidence, which authorized jury to infer that defendant's theory of innocence must be rational and must find its support on facts or on evidence before he would be entitled to an acquittal, was erroneous since the proof must establish defendant's guilt, and absence of proof, whether circumstantial or direct, entitled defendant to rest on the legal inference that he was innocent.

APPEAL from the District Court of the Third Judicial District, for Elmore County. Hon. Chas. F. Koelsch, Judge.

Conviction for crime of murder in the first degree. Reversed and a new trial ordered.

Reversed and remanded with direction.

Carl Burke, Harry Keyser and Perce E. Hall, for Appellant.

"In order to sustain a conviction based solely on circumstantial evidence, the circumstances must be consistent with the guilt of the defendant, and inconsistent with his innocence, and incapable of explanation on any other reasonable hypothesis than that of guilt." (State v. Marcoe, 33 Idaho 284, 193 P. 80; State v. Levy, 9 Idaho 483, 75 P. 227; State v. Hurst, 36 Idaho 156, 209 P. 724; State v. McLennan, 40 Idaho 286, 231 P. 718.)

"A charge of murder in the first degree includes a charge of murder in the second degree and a charge of manslaughter, and it is error to refuse to so instruct the jury upon request." (People v. Dunn, 1 Idaho 74; State v. Lindsey, 19 Nev. 47, 5 P. 822, 3 Am. St. 776; State v. Alcorn, 7 Idaho 599, 64 P. 1014, 97 Am. St. 252; State v. Phinney, 13 Idaho 307, 89 P. 634, 12 Ann. Cas. 1079, 12 L. R. A., N. S., 935; Matter of McLeod, 23 Idaho 257, 264, 128 P. 1106, L. R. A., N. S., 813.)

J. W. Taylor, Attorney General, R. W. Beckwith, E. G. Elliott, Lawrence B. Quinn and D. W. Thomas, Assistants Attorney General, for Respondent.

In order to sustain a conviction based solely on circumstantial evidence, the evidence need not demonstrate the guilt of the defendant beyond the possibility of his innocence; and if the circumstances as proved produce a moral conviction to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt, they need not be absolutely incompatible, on any reasonable hypothesis, with the innocence of the accused. (State v. Marcoe, 33 Idaho 284, 193 P. 80; State v. McLennan, 40 Idaho 286, 231 P. 718; State v. Dawn, 42 Idaho 210, 245 P. 74; State v. Yancey, 47 Idaho 1, 272 P. 495.)

It is not error to refuse to instruct the jury that the defendant might be guilty of lesser offenses included in that charged when there is no evidence that would tend to reduce the offense charged. (State v. Thomas, 47 Idaho 760, 278 P. 773; State v. Brooks, 49 Idaho 404, 288 P. 894; State v. Monteith, 53 Idaho 30, 20 P.2d 1023; State v. Garney, 45 Idaho 768, 265 P. 668, 669; State v. Alvord, 47 Idaho 162, 272 P. 1010.)

AILSHIE, J. Holden, C. J., and Morgan and Givens, JJ., concur, Budge, J., concurs in the conclusion.

OPINION

AILSHIE, J.

Appellant was informed against upon the charge of murder in the first degree. For convenience we will refer to the appellant as defendant. The information contained two counts: First, that the defendant, on or about the 20th of November, 1936, "wilfully, feloniously, and of his deliberately premeditated malice aforethought, did shoot" and kill one Frank W. Miller. The second count charged that on or about the 20th day of November, 1936, at or near Mayfield, Elmore county, defendant, then and there being, did wilfully and feloniously, with intent to commit robbery from the person of Frank W. Miller, make an assault on said Miller with a certain gun by him the said William Hix then and there held, and did then and there wilfully, feloniously, with intent to commit robbery from the person of Frank W. Miller, fire and discharge said gun at the person of the said Frank W. Miller and then and there inflicted upon him a mortal wound from which he, the said Miller, instantly died. Trial was had and defendant was convicted of the crime of murder in the first degree, with recommendation that the death penalty be inflicted and judgment was thereupon entered, from which this appeal has been prosecuted.

The evidence introduced was entirely circumstantial. There was no direct evidence to establish the principal or primary fact that defendant committed the homicide. In view of the fact, that the assistant attorney general who argued this case insisted that part of the evidence was direct instead of circumstantial, we pause to note that there is a material distinction between direct evidence of a primary fact, such, for instance, as is involved here; that is, the actual commission of a homicide; and evidence of the links in a chain of circumstances which, when all taken together, prove or tend to prove the commission of the primary criminal act involved. While the evidence of the particular circumstances may be direct and positive, that does not make the evidence of such circumstances direct and positive evidence of the major essential fact to be proven. In other words, the proof of the facts which go to make up the circumstances, from which the logical conclusion follows, that the man is guilty of a certain act, must, in themselves, be facts; but that does not constitute them either direct or positive evidence of the main fact, to wit, the commission of the act charged. They still remain links in the chain of circumstances which point either to guilt or innocence.

"Circumstantial evidence produces no witnesses who saw the questioned circumstance occur. It presents a series of facts related to the alleged principal fact, and, having placed them before the court as premises, suggests that they, together with the ordinary experiences of mankind, demand a conclusion that the alleged principal fact occurred. Circumstantial evidence...