State v. Morris

• Decision Date: 14 November 1905
• Citation: 128 Iowa 717,105 N.W. 213
• Parties: STATE v. MORRIS.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

128 Iowa 717

105 N.W. 213

STATE

v.MORRIS.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Nov. 14, 1905.

Appeal from District Court, Polk County; W. H. McHenry, Judge.

Defendant was indicted for assault with intent to commit manslaughter, and convicted of assault with intent to commit great bodily injury. From a judgment on this conviction, imposing a fine of $100, defendant appeals. Reversed and remanded.Bowen, Brockett & Weldy, for appellant.

Chas. W. Mullan, Atty. Gen., Lawrence De Graff, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Jesse A. Miller, Co. Atty., for the State.

McCLAIN, J.

The abstract of appellant presents only the indictment and the instructions, and the appellant relies upon errors in the instructions for a reversal. Many of the objections are, as we think, without merit, and a discussion of them involving the consideration in detail of the language of the particular instructions would be of no advantage. It is sufficient to say that as it seems to us there was no prejudicial error in the instruction of the court defining the crime charged, and the included crimes of assault with intent to commit great bodily injury and a simple assault. The definition of assault with intent to commit manslaughter is criticised on the ground that the court failed to include a specific intent as an essential element of the crime. However this may be, we fail to see how defendant can complain of an instruction as to the offense for which he is indicted, but of which he is acquitted, where the effect of the error in the instruction would be to render it easier for the jury to convict him of such offense. Certainly the jury would be no more likely to convict him of an included crime because of such an erroneous instruction with regard to the crime charged in the indictment. Counsel contend that the instruction became the law of the case, and that under such instruction there was no substantial difference between assault with intent to commit manslaughter and assault with intent to commit great bodily injury, and that the verdict should be set aside because the jury under the instruction did not convict of the higher offense. We think, however, that the offense of assault with intent to commit great bodily injury was correctly defined, and see no reason for setting aside the verdict on defendant's complaint that he might have been convicted of the higher offense. It is a sufficient answer to the argument for appellant to say that, even if the jurors were entirely unable to understand the definition of assault with intent to commit manslaughter, yet, if they found facts justifying a conviction of assault with intent to commit great bodily injury which was properly defined, the verdict of guilty as to that charge would be unobjectionable so far as defendant is concerned. There may be cases, of course, where the definition of the lower degree or the included crime of which the defendant is convicted is so dependent upon the definition given of the higher degree or of the including crime charged that errors in the latter will require that the conviction be set aside. But we cannot imagine how in the present case the jury could have been misled by any definition of assault with intent to commit manslaughter into convicting the defendant of assault with intent to commit great bodily injury without his being guilty of the latter offense, and this suggestion obviates the necessity for any elaborate discussion of the conclusion reached by this court in State v. Adams, 78 Iowa, 292, 43 N. W. 194. In that case there was an indictment for murder and a conviction for manslaughter, and complaint was made of an instruction that the annoyance resulting from a charivari would not constitute such provocation as to reduce the homicide to manslaughter. The court held this instruction to be erroneous and reversed because, even under the conviction for manslaughter, the instruction was prejudicial to defendant, in that its tendency was “to confuse and mislead the jury as to one of the most important questions in the case and to impress upon their minds that the conduct of the parties engaged in the tumult should be lightly considered by them.” But the failure of the court in the present case to refer to the intent necessary to...