State v. Rome

• Decision Date: 29 May 1894
• Citation: 64 Conn. 329,30 A. 57
• Parties: STATE v. ROME.
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court

30 A. 57

64 Conn. 329

STATE

v. ROME.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

May 29, 1894.

Appeal from superior court, Fairfield county; Hamersley, Judge.

Samuel W. Rome was convicted of arson, and appeals. Affirmed.

J. C. Chamberlain and Nathaniel W. Bishop, for appellant.

Samuel Fessenden, State Atty., for the State.

FENN, J. The appellant was tried and convicted in the superior court for Fairfield county upon an information charging him with the crime of arson. Upon the trial the state offered no direct evidence of the act of setting fire to the building burned, but relied upon facts and circumstances claimed to have been proved to establish the guilt of the accused. The reasons of appeal, seven in number, relate solely to alleged errors in the charge of the court to the jury. These reasons present in effect three claims: First, to use the language of the appellant's brief, that the court erred in giving to the jury instructions which "amount substantially to the following proposition of law: That, for the practical purposes of the trial, there is no difference between what is called 'circumstantial' and what is called 'direct' evidence; that the same weight is to be given to each; and that the same criterion of sufficiency is applied to both alike." Second, that the court gave instructions to the jury which were "argumentative, and well calculated to give to the jury a strong impression that the court was of the opinion that the accused was guilty of the crime charged, and was endeavoring to bring them to his views." Third, that the charge, as a whole, is erroneous "because it contains only the claims of the state, and the facts upon which it relied for conviction, and completely passes over the evidence offered by the defense to disprove these." These claims we will consider in the order above indicated.

The material language of the charge, in reference to what is called "circumstantial evidence," is as follows: "It is sometimes said that circumstantial evidence is not as satisfactory as direct evidence. As a general proposition, that is not true. Indeed, all evidence is essentially circumstantial evidence; that is, evidence in every case consists in the proof of certain circumstances, from which you are asked, in the exercise of your reason and common sense, to infer the guilt of the accused. By 'direct evidence' is usually meant the testimony of a witness who claims to have seen the commission of the act charged as crime. But such testimony is merely one circumstance from which you are asked to infer the guilt of the accused, and such circumstance, by itself, is rarely sufficient to justify a conviction. To illustrate: A witness testifies that he saw the accused strike a match from which the fire charged as a crime resulted. Such testimony, by itself alone, by no means satisfactorily proves the crime. To constitute the crime the act must be accompanied by a criminal intent, and that intent can only be inferred from the circumstances surrounding the act. But the commission of the act cannot safely be inferred from the bare statement of the witness. He says he saw the accused; that is, he saw a person so resembling the accused that he believed the accused to be that person Now, whether you can safely infer the fact that the accused is the person depends upon the circumstances to be proved, such as the condition of the light, the distance, familiarity with the appearance of the accused, and accuracy of sight And the fact to be inferred from the statement of the witness depends also upon other circumstances, such as the capacity of the witness to remember accurately, his truthfulness, bias, or interest in the result, and the like. You can readily see that in every case the inference of guilt must be drawn from circumstances, and that all satisfactory proof must depend on circumstantial evidence; and I am sure that your own common sense will lead you to a conclusion that, when a satisfactory inference of guilt is based mainly on the one circumstance of the testimony of one eyewitness, there is more danger of error—more danger of mistake—than when an equally satisfactory Inference of guilt is based upon several important circumstances showing the guilt of the accused, and supported by the concurrent testimony of many witnesses. The truth is, gentlemen, that for the practical purposes of the trial there is no difference between what is called 'circumstantial evidence' and what is called 'direct evidence.' Any attempt to so classify evidence serves only to confuse, and to divert the minds of the jury from the single legitimate question, 'Does the evidence in this case satisfy you of the guilt of the accused, beyond any reasonable doubt?' It is sometimes said that in cases of circumstantial evidence every reasonable hypothesis consistent with the innocence of the accused must be excluded; and it is said by the author from whom I am asked to read, 'Where a criminal charge is to be proved by circumstantial evidence, the proof ought to be, not only consistent with the person's guilt, but inconsistent with any other rational conclusion.' This is true, but no more true of so-called circumstantial evidence than of so-called direct evidence. In any case, if the evidence is consistent with a reasonable hypothesis or supposition that the prisoner is innocent, there must be a reasonable doubt of his guilt; and the meaning of this phrase is substantially the same as that of the more usual and safe formula,—in order to convict the accused in any case the jury must be satisfied of his guilt, by the evidence, beyond any reasonable doubt."

The claim on the part of the appellant is that the courts and text writers have recognized a marked distinction between the two classes of evidence, direct and circumstantial, and that while the absolute necessity of convicting on circumstantial evidence is strongly urged for the safety of society, in view of the secrecy of many crimes, yet that juries have been and should be warned that this class of evidence must be weighed with greater caution than direct. The real point of the appellant's contention appears to be this: That it was not enough to tell the jury, as they were most distinctly told by the court, that "the proof ought to be not only consistent with the person's guilt, but inconsistent with any other rational conclusion,"—an extreme statement, except as limited by the court to be equivalent to proof beyond reasonable doubt, but which, it is said, applies only to the circumstances taken as a whole and in aggregation, but that the jury should have been further instructed that "every single circumstances forming a part of the whole combination of circumstances relied on for conviction must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt," and that the jury "should not only be satisfied from a consideration of the circumstances, both singly and as a whole, that guilt has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt, but that from each and all of the circumstances no reasonable hypothesis can be adduced consistent with innocence." This, it seems to us, is requiring the statement to the jury of a rule which would indeed well serve the purpose of a defendant in a criminal case, since it would in all probability be misunderstood, and certainly, if understood and followed, would render conviction, in any case where so-called circumstantial evidence had alone been introduced, impossible. Conclusions of jurors in all cases result from inferences. The circumstances on which the inferences are based, in all cases, must be directly proved; and in criminal cases each fact, the existence of which is necessary to the conclusion of the guilt of the accused, must be so proved beyond a reasonable doubt. Every fact...