State v. Justus, 5897
| Decision Date | 28 January 1959 |
| Docket Number | No. 5897,5897 |
| Citation | 65 N.M. 195,334 P.2d 1104,1959 NMSC 8 |
| Parties | STATE of New Mexico, Defendant-in-Error, v. Milton Carl JUSTUS, Plaintiff-in-Error. |
| Court | New Mexico Supreme Court |
O. Russell Jones, Jack Smith, Santa Fe, for plaintiff in error.
Fred M. Standley, Atty. Gen., Robert F. Pyatt, Fred M. Calkins, Jr., Asst. Attys. Gen., for defendant in error.
The appellant (hereafter called the defendant) was convicted of first degree murder. The trial jury recommended clemency and thereafter the defendant was given a life sentence in the penitentiary. The circumstances of the offense were that on January 8, 1954, the deceased, Edward G. Meyer, and the defendant appeared at the Tucumcari General Hospital in Tucumcari, New Mexico, and the deceased was given a shot of pencillin because he had a cold. At that time, deceased was dressed in the uniform of the Armed Forces of the United States. Subsequently, the two men registered at a motel in Tucumcari, the deceased paying for the same, and at the time of registering the deceased asked for a water bottle and was furnished an empty wine bottle for this purpose. The car belonging to deceased, being driven by the defendant, was backed into the space provided for it in the motel and the two men entered the room. The next morning, it was discovered that one of the beds was smeared with blood, with fragments of the wine bottle both on the bed and on the floor nearby. On this same bed there was a pillow with an indentation of where a head had apparently been, covered with blood and chips of glass. The rest of the room was in comparatively good order, except that the other bed showed signs of having been slept in. About noon on January 9th, the defendant was next seen in Miami, Texas, and the service station operator noticed a soldier lying in the automobile with blood on his clothing and face. Shortly thereafter, the defendant drove to Canadian, Texas, and there, in company with a Texas sheriff, took the deceased to the hospital. The deceased was taken to the emergency room and died at about 4:00 o'clock that afternoon. The defendant gave varying stories as to the circumstances to the Texas officers, first saying that he found the deceased by the road, later that he had hit him over the head while he was sleeping in the car near Amarillo, and finally stating that he and the deceased had got into a fight in the motel in Tucumcari and that he had hit the deceased over the head with a whiskey bottle. The defendant also originally stated that the car was his, although he later said it belonged to the deceased, and there was some testimony with respect to the defendant originally claiming that he was the deceased. According to the defendant's final statement to the officers, the argument in Tucumcari was over the Korean War and World War II and about which was the toughest, and that after the fight the defendant and deceased decided that they should leave the motel before the proprietor saw the damage and the blood and the tearing up of the room, and that it this way they would not have to pay for the same. It was also testified that the deceased came to his death by reason of a fractured skull and resulting hemorrhage causing pressure upon the brain, and that by reason of the type of the injury that the same would have caused unconsciousness for a short period thereafter perhaps some type of lucid interval, followed by unconsciousness and then death.
In addition to the car, there was found in the defendant's possession some of the property of the deceased, including some traveler's checks which were found in the defendant's shoe after he had been returned to Tucumcari.
The information filed in the case charged the defendant with the crime of murder. Subsequently, there was a bill of particulars filed which alleged:
'The State's theory of the case is that the defendant killed Edward G. Meyer while perpetrating a felony, to-wit: Robbery of Edward G. Meyer.'
The defendant seeks a reversal of his conviction, first, on the ground that the trial court failed to properly instruct the jury; secondly, on the ground that the trial court erroneously instructed the jury as to second degree murder and voluntary manslaughter; and, lastly, that the conviction is not supported by substantial and competent evidence.
The trial court in its instructions to the jury gave them the basic instructions on common law murder in the first degree, the second degree, and manslaughter. In addition, and at the defendant's own request, the court gave the following instruction:
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...896; Kelley v. State (1943), 181 Md. 642, 31 A.2d 614; Simpson v. State (1893), 92 Ga. 41, 17 S.E. 984, 22 L.R.A. 248; State v. Justus (1959), 65 N.M. 195, 334 P.2d 1104; and 22 C.J.S. Criminal Law § 185(17), p. Cass County had jurisdiction to try this case. Defendant further asks that he b......
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State v. Flowers
...which was urged by defendant, and is his only claim of error in the instructions upon which he may now rely. State v. Justus, 65 N.M. 195, 334 P.2d 1104 (1959), cert. denied, 365 U.S. 828, 81 S.Ct. 714, 5 L.Ed.2d 706 (1961). See also State v. Lopez, 79 N.M. 282, 442 P.2d 594 (1968); State v......
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United States ex rel. Pascarella v. Radakovich
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