State v. Lauth

• Decision Date: 28 April 1905
• Citation: 80 P. 660,46 Or. 342
• Parties: STATE v. LAUTH.
• Court: Oregon Supreme Court

80 P. 660

46 Or. 342

STATE v. LAUTH.

Supreme Court of Oregon

April 28, 1905

Appeal from Circuit Court, Clackamas County; T.A. McBride, Judge.

George W. Lauth was convicted of murder in the first degree, and he appeals. Affirmed.

George C. Brownell and G.B. Dimick, for appellant.

A.M Crawford, Atty. Gen., and Harrison Allen, Dist. Atty., for the State.

WOLVERTON C.J.

The defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree for killing one Leonora B. Jones, his mistress, and adjudged to pay the penalty imposed by statute. He interposed the plea of insanity at the trial, and, with a view to establishing the defense, called Charles R. Noblitt, who related that he was at the depot in Oregon City the night before the killing that he did not see the defendant there, but saw him a little while afterwards. Thereupon one of the counsel for the defendant stated that he desired to show the actions of the woman when she got off the train, with reference to another man, and that her conduct there was afterwards made known to the defendant, which request the court denied saying: "I do not think a man can set up, in a case of this kind, jealousy, or anger or frenzy caused by jealousy--caused by the fact that a woman had abandoned him. I do not believe it is a good defense. If you can show this man was insane, it is a defense. But I do not think that the law recognizes that the abandonment of a man by his mistress is any legal provocation for taking her life. If you expect to offer any evidence tending to show that he was insane, the court will admit it." Counsel then further stated that the woman came down on the train with certain parties, who were seen by two policemen, which fact was communicated to the defendant, and requested permission to show the subsequent acts of the defendant, answering which the court again ruled as follows: "I want to lay this down as the law: That a frenzy arising from jealousy or anger is not insanity. The difference between them, in law, is as wide as the poles. It is the duty of a man to control his passions but he cannot control disease. I will admit anything that you can introduce to show the condition of this defendant's mind--anything that was communicated to him. As I say, what the fact might be would not be material, but what was communicated to him might be material, with a view of determining what kind of a mind he had." Objections were saved to these rulings and form the basis of the first assignment of error. Insanity, to excuse crime, must be such as dethrones reason and renders the subject incapable of discerning right from wrong, or of understanding or appreciating the extent, nature, consequences, or effect of his wrongful act. State v. Murray, 11 Or. 413, 5 P. 55; State v. Zorn, 22 Or. 591, 30 P. 317. It has been said that "a mere uncontrollable impulse of the mind, coexisting with the full possession of the reasoning powers, will not warrant an acquittal on the ground of insanity; the question for the jury being whether the prisoner, at the time he committed the act, knew the character and nature of the act, and that it was a wrongful one." Reg. v. Barton, 3 Cox, C.C. 275, headnote. This appears to be the rule in England. The rule as it obtains in this country is lucidly but concisely stated by Mr. McClain (1 Crim.Law, § 157) as follows: "As indicated in the preceding paragraph, there are some cases which lend countenance to the idea that an irresistible impulse to the commission of the crime will be an excuse; but in many cases, and, indeed, by a great weight of authority, irresistible impulse or uncontrollable passion is held not to be a defense. Where the criminal has sufficient mental capacity to distinguish between right and wrong, mere passion or frenzy produced by anger, jealousy, or other passions will not excuse. There may, indeed, be insane impulses which are so far uncontrollable that there is no criminal liability therefor, but they must be shown to be the result of a diseased mind, and not merely of passion or impulse, though it is said in one case that uncontrollable impulses, due to provocation and disappointment, exaggerated by a disordered mind, might be taken into account to relieve the degree of homicide. But what is called moral or emotional insanity is distinctly repudiated as an excuse in perhaps all the cases in which such defense has been directly considered." In further support thereof, see State v. Hansen, 25 Or. 391, 35 P. 976, 36 P. 296; Goodwin v. State, 96 Ind. 550; McCarty v. Commonwealth, 71 S.W. 656, 24 Ky.Law Rep. 1427. Thus it is obvious that a paroxysm of jealousy or sudden anger or frenzy of temper, provoked or superinduced by the intelligence that the accused had been abandoned by his mistress, the object of his lustful affections--he being otherwise in possession of his mental faculties, unimpaired by disease or unbalanced by heredity--will not relieve him of criminal responsibility; and the trial court's rulings or observations were in accord with this understanding of the law. The rule was pithily stated, with something of epigrammatical emphasis, but there was no purpose manifest of attracting any particular attention to that phase of the case any more than to any other. The court distinctly stated that any evidence tending to show insanity would be admitted, and, to that end, that it would allow the acts and conduct of the defendant to be proven, as well as any communications made to him relative to the deportment of the woman. This gave ample scope for maintaining the defense interposed, and, when taken in connection with the general charge that the jury had a right to take into consideration the condition of mind of the defendant at the time he committed the homicide, as bearing upon the degree of the offense of which he was guilty, it is manifest that there was no error of which he could complain.

The only other error assigned arises from the conduct of John Page, who sat on the jury. The following is his examination, and the answers elicited on his voir dire: "Q. I will ask you if you have heard or read anything about this case? A. No, sir. Q. Did you read anything about it in the newspapers at the time it is alleged to have happened? A. No, sir; I believe not. Q. You knew there was such a case on the docket, did you? A. I did. Q. I will ask you if, on or about the 6th day of September, when this alleged offense is supposed to have happened, if you heard the matter discussed any? A. No, sir. Q. Then you know nothing about what purports to be the facts in this case? A. Not a thing. Q. I will ask you, if you were accepted as a juror in this case, you'd be willing to go into the jury box and eliminate any impression, if you have one, as to the guilt or innocence of the defendant, and try the case solely upon the evidence, and the law as given you by the court? A. Yes, sir." Being accepted by the defendant, the district attorney further examined him as follows: "Q. Have you any conscientious scruples against the infliction of capital punishment for murder? A. Not at all. Q. Have you ever been a close friend of Mr. Brownell or Mr. Dimick? A. No, sir. Q. Are you acquainted with any of the witnesses in the case? A. Carll is the only one I know. I don't know any of them, only Carll. Q. Do you know any reason why you could not give both sides an absolutely fair and impartial trial? A. I could. Q. You could? A. Yes, sir. Q. Have you no opinion at all? A. None whatever." After verdict the defendant moved to set it aside and for a new trial on the ground, as alleged, that the juror made false answers to the questions thus propounded to him touching his qualifications to sit as a trior in the cause, and therefore he was not accorded a trial by a fair and impartial jury. To prove the falsity charged, the affidavits of Henry W. Trembath and G.B. Dimick, one of the counsel for the defendant, were produced.

Trembath is a constable, and took charge of the defendant very soon after the tragedy; receiving him from the father of the deceased, who then had him in custody. He swears that immediately after he received the defendant into his custody, the defendant informed him that his (defendant's) gun or pistol, which he then had in his pocket, contained only one loaded shell, and that he had shot four loads into the body of the deceased; that he (affiant) was subpoenaed as a witness, and testified before the coroner's jury relative to what the defendant had told him; that immediately after the inquest he met Page, the juror, in front of the courthouse, and there talked with him, and told him all about the shooting of the deceased, and also what the defendant had told him (affiant) in regard to the loaded and empty shells remaining in the pistol, and, in fact, all that he had testified to before the coroner's jury. Further, that he related to him all the facts, as he (affiant) understood them, leading up to the homicide; that thereafter, about the last of September, 1904, affiant again met Page in the sheriff's office, and there talked with him about the shooting, wounding, and killing of the deceased by the defendant; that the affiant was in the courthouse when Page was drawn on the panel as a juror; that he was asked, while being examined touching his qualifications, if he was acquainted with any of the witnesses for the state (the names on the information being read to him at his request; that of affiant among the rest); and that he answered that Dr. Carll was the only one. The affiant further deposed that he had been acquainted with Page for a long time prior to the date of the killing. Dimick deposes that on or about December 1, 1904, Page admitted to him, in the presence of Trembath, that he had talked with the...