State v. Price
| Decision Date | 17 October 1924 |
| Docket Number | 36224 |
| Citation | 200 N.W. 195,198 Iowa 747 |
| Parties | STATE OF IOWA, Appellee, v. TOM PRICE, Appellant |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Appeal from Wapello District Court.--W. M. WALKER, Judge.
THE defendant was indicted for the crime of assault with intent to commit murder, and was convicted, and prosecutes this appeal.
Reversed.
Gilmore & Moon, for appellant.
Ben J Gibson, Attorney-general, Neill Garrett, Assistant Attorney-general, and W. W. Epps, County Attorney, for appellee.
I. Appellant is a married man. On the evening of the altercation out of which the indictment in this cause arose appellant's wife had attended a dance, with some friends of hers. The record shows that one Bowes had been intimately acquainted with appellant's wife for some time, and was present at the dance, and twice endeavored to dance with appellant's wife. Appellant went to the dance near midnight, for the purpose of going home with his wife; and appellant and his wife and Bowes left the place at about the same time. The evidence tends to show that shortly after leaving the dance, Bowes approached appellant and took hold of him; that some words passed between them, and blows were exchanged. After this, appellant got into a Ford car and drove away, and Bowes walked down the street, in company with some friends. Very shortly after this, Bowes approached the car where appellant had stopped, and observed appellant getting out of the car. An altercation followed almost immediately; and during this, Bowes was stabbed by a knife in the hand of appellant. It is the contention of appellant that Bowes approached him with a knife, and that he took the knife away from Bowes and stabbed Bowes with it.
But two errors for reversal are urged on the appeal: one respecting the exclusion of testimony, and the other in regard to the instructions.
Appellant was permitted to prove that Bowes had been on intimate terms with his wife, and that she had informed appellant of Bowes' attentions to her. In connection with this subject-matter, appellant testified that he had obtained and read a letter which Bowes had written to appellant's wife. The letter was identified and offered in evidence in behalf of appellant, and, on objection, it was excluded. The letter so offered was written some thirteen or fourteen months before the fight. The letter is undoubtedly what is commonly described as a "love letter." In it Bowes refers to the fact that he had been out west, and returned to be with appellant's wife. He protested his love for her, and expressed a desire to see her or hear from her.
This letter was properly admissible in evidence, under the facts in this case. The court seems to have been of the opinion, in making its ruling, that the letter was not admissible because of the remoteness of time between its writing and the time of the fight; and the State contends that there had been ample opportunity for "cooling time," between the writing of the letter and the altercation. We think, however, that the court adopted an erroneous view of the purpose of the introduction of this letter. It was not claimed that appellant struck Bowes in the heat of passion, or that he sought out Bowes because of the contents of the letter, to do him injury. The contention of appellant throughout the trial was that Bowes was the assailant and the aggressor, and that appellant did all that he did in self-defense. Bowes, on the other hand, as the prosecuting witness, testified that appellant was the aggressor. Under these circumstances, it was proper for the jury to have before them the evidence in regard to the relation that existed between Bowes and appellant's wife. This was not for the purpose of justifying appellant or excusing him, if he was the aggressor, but it did have a legitimate and proper bearing on the question as to who was the aggressor; and this, of course, was involved in appellant's contention that he struck in self-defense. The evidence had an important bearing upon the question of the existence of a hostile motive in the mind of the witness Bowes toward appellant, and as bearing on the question of who was the aggressor in the altercation. A similar question was before us in State v. Thomas, 169 Iowa 591, 151 N.W. 842, in which we said:
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