State v. Lancaster

• Decision Date: 26 March 1958
• Docket Number: No. 35351,35351
• Citation: 71 A.L.R.2d 1017,167 Ohio St. 391,149 N.E.2d 157
• Parties: , 71 A.L.R.2d 1017, 5 O.O.2d 28 the STATE of Ohio, Appellee, v. LANCASTER, Appellant.
• Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Page 391

167 Ohio St. 391

149 N.E.2d 157, 71 A.L.R.2d 1017, 5 O.O.2d 28

the STATE of Ohio, Appellee, v. LANCASTER, Appellant.

No. 35351.

Supreme Court of Ohio.

March 26, 1958.

Syllabus by the Court

1. In a murder case, evidence of motive or lack thereof upon the part of the accused is relevant and material.

2. Motive is not an element of the crime of murder and need not be established to warrant a conviction; proof of motive does not establish guilt, nor does want of proof thereof establish innocence; and, where the guilt of the accused is shown beyond a reasonable doubt, it is immaterial what the motive may have been for the crime, or whether any motive is shown.

3. Where, in a murder case, the evidence is purely circumstantial, the identification of the killer is not shown by direct evidence, and, therefore, his identity must be proved, motive or lack thereof becomes an important question, and in such a case the trial court has a duty to instruct the jury that it should take the evidence on that question into consideration, together with all the other evidence and circumstances, in determining the guilt or innocence of the accused.

4. Where, in a murder case, there is direct evidence of a deliberate killing without provocation, and the determination of the guilt or innocence of the accused depends upon the credibility of witnesses to the act of killing, the trial court is not required to charge upon the question of motive.

5. Motive for the commission of murder need not be based solely upon hope of material gain but may consist of, among other things, jealousy, disappointment or mortification.

The Grand Jury of Summit County indicted Lancaster, appellant herein and hereinafter designated defendant, for murder in the first degree, charging him with unlawfully, purposely and with deliberate and premeditated malice killing one Louise E. Wallick.

Upon his trial in the Court of Common Pleas, the jury returned a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree, without a recommendation of mercy, and the court sentenced the defendant to death in the electric chair.

Upon appeal to the Court of Appeals, that court affirmed the judgment of the Court of Common Pleas but found that the judgment of the Court of Appeals is in conflict with a judgment of the Court of Appeals for Wood County and with a judgment of the Court of Appeals for Cuyahoga County and certified the record of this cause to this court for review and final determination.

In the appeal to this court, claimed errors are assigned as follows:

1. 'The Court of Appeals erred in affirming the judgment of the Common Pleas Court and in failing to reverse the same.'

2. 'The trial court erred in its general charge to the jury.'

3. 'The trial court erred in refusing to give to the jury the instructions seasonably requested by appellant's counsel.'

4. 'The trial court erred in the admission of evidence offered by the state of Ohio, to the prejudice of the appellant.'

5. 'The appellant was denied a fair trial by reason of the misconduct of the assistant prosecuting attorney and the prosecutor in the course of their argument to the jury, by stating facts not within the record tending to create an unjust prejudice against the defendant: a) in calling the attention of the jury to the failure of the appellant to offer character witnesses in his behalf; b) in referring over the objection of appellant's counsel to questions and evidence which the court had ruled objectionable; and c) in stating to the jury that the defendant had had his chance, and that he was given mercy by the Municipal Court.'

6. 'The trial court erred in overruling the motion of appellant for a new trial.'

The statement of facts as narrated by Judge Doyle in the opinion of the Court of Appeals is so accurate and fair that we quote it:

'Mrs. Louise E. Wallick, the deceased, at the time of her death and for some time previous thereto, resided in her own home with her 13-year-old daughter, Evelyn.

'The defendant resided in the same house, as a roomer and boarder, and from the direct testimony of the defendant, and inferences reasonably drawn from the witnesses for the state the relationship between the deceased and the defendant was more than one of strictly business, having developed into an amatory and perhaps illicit connection.

'Be that as it may, on October 8, 1956 (the date upon which Mrs. Wallick was shot and killed), and for some time prior thereto, the deceased and the defendant quarreled over various matters, including the objection on the part of the defendant to the association of the deceased with other men.

'On the evening of the shooting, the deceased told the defendant to leave her home. He refused this request, with the suggestion that if she wanted his clothes out of the house, she should throw them out. He then telephoned a sister of Mrs. Wallick, a Mrs. Hazel Root, and the following quotation from the testimony of Mrs. Root reflects the conversation:

'Q. Would you tell the jury what the conversation was? A. Well, when the phone rang and I answered * * * it was Joe [the defendant] and he said that him and Louise were quarreling and she had ordered him out and he said the only reason she wants me out is she wants somebody by the name of John * * * and by that time Louise [the deceased] took the phone and she said he held a gun on me yesterday and I am afraid of him and that was all she said and all he said was well, I am going to help her and that is all that was said. He said in the background when she said he held a gun on me, in the background he said I don't even own a gun.

'The evidence offered by the state tended to prove that, following this conversation with Mrs. Root, the deceased and her daughter retired to their bedroom and changed into their night clothes. The defendant remained in the house. The daughter then proceeded to an adjoining bathroom; the mother followed and seated herself on the commode, and the two conversed while the daughter brushed her teeth.

'At this time the defendant pushed the bathroom door open, and the daughter stepped sideways to a place between a wash basin and a clothes hamper, thereby cutting off the defendant's view of her, but leaving the mother in full view of the daughter.

'The daughter's testimony, reflecting the next event, was as follows:

"Q. All right. While you were there brushing your teeth having this conversation with your mother, I want you to tell the jury what happened. A. After she told me I couldn't go [to a basketball game], I was brushing my teeth and standing in front of the wash basin, and he [the defendant] started to come in and he pushed the door and it hit me in the back, and I moved to one side and my mother sat there and he came in where I could see his face and gun and the biggest part of his arm and my mother just sat there, she didn't say * * *.

"* * *

"Evelyn, will you go on from there and tell us what else happened? A. Well, she just sat there and he came in and then he said, 'I have warned you about this for a long time,' and I just stood there, I didn't know what to do, and then I heard a click and then I heard the explosion, and my mother fell over on the side and hit the wash basin, and in order for me to get out of the bathroom he had to move first, and I ran down the steps and across the lawn and told the next [-door] neighbor.'

'The deceased was shot in the forehead from a distance of six to eight inches; was rendered unconscious, and died within a period of four hours.

'Following the shooting, the defendant walked to his bedroom, and the daughter ran from the house to the next-door neighbor, who in turn called the police. The police arrived within a few minutes. Likewise arrived Mrs. Root, the deceased's sister, to whom the defendant had talked on the telephone 15 or 20 minutes before. Mrs. Root, obviously, in the light of her conversation with the defendant and her sister, accused the defendant of shooting her sister. * * * [It was] stated on the witness stand: 'He did not make any replies or denials; he said nothing.'

'The foregoing recitation of facts was in substance the state's case.

The testimony of the defendant was that: He had arrived at the home from his work at about 7:30 p. m.; he had stopped en route and drank a 'double shot of whiskey'; upon his arrival he was affectionately greeted with a kiss; and he and the deceased ate supper, which she had prepared.

'During and after the meal they argued over various matters, in the course of which the defendant testified that he told the deceased he would leave her home; whereupon she suggested that 'if you are going to leave, why don't you go down to the Milner Hotel for the night?' He then further testified: 'I said, what do you mean go down to the Milner Hotel, she said, well, for two or three days to see how you feel and we were bickering back and forth * * * and I said, well, I can leave tonight, and I got up and went up the steps and as I started up the steps she...