State v. Patton
Decision Date | 07 March 1903 |
Docket Number | 13,302 |
Citation | 71 P. 840,66 Kan. 486 |
Parties | THE STATE OF KANSAS v. JOHN PATTON |
Court | Kansas Supreme Court |
Decided January, 1903.
Appeal from Wyandotte district court; E. L. FISCHER, judge.
Judgment affirmed.
SYLLABUS BY THE COURT.
CRIMINAL PRACTICE -- Instruction Defining "Reasonable Doubt." In explaining the term "reasonable doubt" the court instructed the jury that it does not mean a mere possible or imaginary doubt arising from caprice or groundless conjecture; that it is "such a doubt as the jury are able to give a reason for," and that it is that state of the case which, after a comparison and consideration of all the evidence, leaves the minds of the jurors in that condition that they cannot say they feel an abiding conviction, to a moral certainty, of the guilt of the defendant. Held, that the instruction was not erroneous.
James S. Gibson, county attorney, and B. S. Smith, for The State.
C. W Trickett, for appellant.
OPINION
The appellant was convicted of carnally knowing a female under the age of eighteen years. The most meritorious assignment of error is that, in explaining reasonable doubt, the court instructed the jury that it is "such a doubt as the jury are able to give a reason for." In the same connection the court said that by a reasonable doubt is not meant a mere possible or imaginary doubt arising from caprice or groundless conjecture, and that "it is that state of the case which, after a comparison and consideration of all the evidence, leaves the minds of the jurors in that condition that they cannot say they feel an abiding conviction to a moral certainty of the guilt of the defendant." Some other language was used, not well chosen and not of any assistance to the jury, but because merely inefficacious it was probably not prejudicial, and, hence, not ground for reversal. The question, therefore, is whether it was error to admonish the jury that a reasonable doubt is such a doubt as the jury are able to give a reason for.
The instruction given should be considered as an entirety. By so doing it is observable that in elucidation of the expression "reasonable doubt" the requirement of a reason for doubt is set over against capriciousness, conjecture, the indulgence of speculation upon possibilities, and the invasion of the realm of imagination. Instructions presenting such a contrast have been approved in the following cases: Hodge v. The State, 97 Ala. 37, 12 So. 164, 38 Am. St. Rep. 145; Vann v. The State, 83 Ga. 44, 9 S.E. 945; State v. Jefferson, 43 La. Ann. 995, 10 So. 199; The People v. Guidici, 100 N.Y. 503, 3 N.E. 493; State v. Harras, 25 Wash. 416, 65 P. 774; Wallace v. State, 41 Fla. 547, 26 So. 713; Butler v. The State, 102 Wis. 364, 78 N.W. 590; State v. Rounds, 76 Me. 123; State v. Serenson, 7 S.D. 277, 64 N.W. 130.
Judges of the federal courts have frequently employed equivalent phrases in charging juries in criminal cases. (United States v. Butler et al., 1 Hughes 457; United States v. Johnson, 26 F. 682; United States v. Jackson, 29 id. 503; United States v. Jones, 31 id. 718.)
Similar instructions have been criticized, however, in a number of states. (State v. Morey, 25 Ore. 241, 36 P. 573; State v. Sauer, 38 Minn. 438, 38 N.W. 355; People v. Stubenvall, 62 Mich. 329, 28 N.W. 883; Morgan v. The State, 48 Ohio St. 371, 27 N.E. 710; Klyce v. State , 78 Miss. 450, 28 So. 827.)
Like charges have been declared to be erroneous in the following cases: Siberry v. The State, 133 Ind. 677, 33 N.E. 681; Avery v. The State, 124 Ala. 20, 27 So. 505; State of Iowa v. Cohen, 108 Iowa 208, 78 N.W. 857, 75 Am. St. Rep. 213; Carr v. State, 23 Neb. 749, 37 N.W. 630.
The theory of the instruction is tersely and accurately put in Butler v. State, supra, where it was said:
The objection to such a charge has been considered, and the reasons for its validity well stated, by the courts of Florida and New York.
In Wallace v. State, supra, it was said:
In The People v. Guidici, supra, it was said:
While most discussions of reasonable doubt which venture beyond the restraint of a few fixed forms of expression end in maundering logomachies, an admonition to the jury of the kind in question may, upon infrequent occasions, subserve a useful purpose. It may prevent untrained jurymen from acting under the belief that mere possibility and surmise are sufficient to justify an acquittal, and it may serve to check arbitrariness. Many men take a strange pleasure in acting as they will. Indulgence of this passion is felt to bring augmentation of power, and finally will becomes its own reason. When pressed to justify himself in the jury-room, such an individual must resort to the vague and the sophistical, and is soon exposed. Apropos to this subject, in Thompson on Trials, volume 2, section 2476, Austin Abbott is quoted as follows:
It cannot be said that any error was committed by the trial court in giving the instruction complained of.
The appellant further claims that the district court erred in overruling his motion for a new trial. A discussion of this question at the length required, if entered upon at all, would subserve no useful purpose. No principle of law is involved, and it is sufficient to say that it has been given the consideration its importance demands, and the ruling of the trial court will not be disturbed.
The judgment of the district court is therefore affirmed.
BURCH, J. (dissenting): The view of the law relating to reasonable doubt presented in the foregoing opinion is not my own. It was sufficient for the trial court to say to the jury that they were not to be governed by caprice and conjecture in order to protect against all the evils of such conduct, and to go beyond this, and make a reasonable doubt such a doubt as the jury are able to give a reason for, amounted, in my opinion, to positive misdirection.
There is no escape for any juror, entertaining a reasonable doubt from voting for conviction, unless he can formulate and express a reason...
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...approved by this court in State v. Killion, 95 Kan. 371, 148 P. 643; State v. Roberts (Mullins), 95 Kan. 280, 147 P. 828; State v. Patton, 66 Kan. 486, 71 P. 840. Defendant urges error in the admission of testimony concerning defendant's behavior subsequent to the offense charged. The evide......
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