State v. Pritchett
| Decision Date | 21 April 1890 |
| Citation | 11 S.E. 357,106 N.C. 667 |
| Parties | STATE v. PRITCHETT. |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
Appeal from superior court, Granville county; ARMFIELD, Judge.
Defendant was asked on cross-examination "what he played off crazy for," reference being had to the fact that, when the case stood for trial at a former term, he either was, or professed to be, insane. Held competent, as, if he had admitted that he feigned insanity, it would have discredited his testimony, and tended, with the other evidence, to prove his guilt.
N. T Gulley, for appellant.
The Attorney General, for the State.
In selecting the jury in this case the prisoner challenged a person tendered as a juror for cause assigned. The objection was not sustained by the court, and the prisoner excepted. It appears that a jury was obtained before the prisoner had exhausted his right to challenge peremptorily. It is settled that such exception cannot be sustained. State v Hensley, 94 N.C. 1021, and cases there cited.
The evidence rejected on the trial, referred to in and embraced by the exceptions numbered, respectively, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, was not competent. It referred to what was said and done, after the homicide, on the occasion of the inquest held by the coroner in respect to two pistols, one said to have been that of the prisoner, and the other that of a second party. If the facts intended to be proven in respect to the ownership of these pistols, their calliber, etc., could be pertinent and competent at all, evidence to prove them should have been produced on the trial, without reference to the evidence in respect to them at the curoner's inquest. Moreover, the prisoner could not be allowed to show after the homicide, and after he was arrested, that he "sent and got his pistol," and that of another party, to be examined, with a view to his exculpation. This is so because he could not be allowed to have opportunity to provide evidence in his own behalf. Besides, the evidence, if it had been properly offered, was not of itself relevant. It might have tended very vaguely, remotely, and indirectly, to show that another person killed the deceased. In possible cases the prisoner might show that a person other than himself slew the deceased; but in such cases "the proof must be direct to the fact, and cannot come from admissions or conduct seemingly in recognition of it," or facts that simply give rise to vague conjecture. State v. Gee, 92 N.C. 756.
The prisoner was examined on the trial as a witness in his own behalf, and on the cross-examination the solicitor for the state asked him "what he played off crazy for," having reference to the fact that he, at a former term of the court, professed to be or was insane at the time the action stood for trial. The prisoner objecting, the court allowed the question to be put. We think it was pertinent and competent. If the prisoner had answered, substantially, that he did feign insanity, such answer would have gone to his discredit, and tended, in connection with other evidence, to prove guilt. It would have shown a disposition and a strong purpose to evade justice.
The objection to allowing the witness for the state to testify as to the condition of the pistol with which the prisoner killed the deceased, the next morning after the homicide, was not well founded. The inquiry proposed, though rather general, was such as would probably elicit evidence pertinent and competent. The evidence called for might have identified the pistol, and shown that it had recently been discharged. The evidence given tended to identify it; and otherwise, so far as we can see, it was not of much, if any, importance.
Likewise, the objection to allowing the examination of the superintendent of the insane asylum, as a witness for the state, in respect to the mental condition of the prisoner while he was in the asylum as a patient, cannot be sustained. It was pertinent and proper to ascertain whether the prisoner was insane or otherwise at the time he was committed to the asylum under the order of the court, and whether, if he was insane, as the jury had found him to be, he had recovered his sanity sufficiently to be tried for the offense charged against him. The evidence elicited was important. I tended to show that it was questionable whether the prisoner was insane, as the court supposed he was, and that, if he was, he had recovered his sanity, and might properly be put upon his trial.
When the prisoner was first brought into court, and required to plead to the indictment, his counsel suggested that he was insane, and incapable of pleading. Thereupon the court submitted to a jury a proper issue as to his sanity, and it found that he was sane. The action was continued. At the next term of the court the prisoner's counsel again suggested that he was then insane, and could not plead. Thereupon a second jury found that he was insane, and the court made its order directing that the prisoner "be confined in the lunatic asylum at Goldsborough, in said state, for treatment by the authorities thereof, until his mind may be restored so that he may be competent to plead to the indictment against him in this behalf, upon the happening of which event the authorities of said asylum are hereby ordered to notify the clerk of the superior court for the county of Granville to the end that he may be returned to said county for...
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