State v. Schneider

• Decision Date: 22 September 1930
• Docket Number: 22316.
• Citation: 158 Wash. 504,291 P. 1093
• Parties: STATE v. SCHNEIDER.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

291 P. 1093

158 Wash. 504

STATE v. SCHNEIDER.

No. 22316.

Supreme Court of Washington, En Banc.

September 22, 1930

Appeal from Superior Court, Walla Walla County; John L. Sharpstein Judge.

George Schneider was convicted of murder in the first degree, and he appeals.

Reversed with instructions.

H. B Noland, of Walla Walla, for appellant.

W. G. Coleman, of Walla Walla, for the State.

BEALS J.

Defendant was by information charged with the crime of murder in the first degree committed upon the person of his wife, Eva M., or Betty, Schneider, whom he assaulted on March 31, 1929, striking and cutting her with a heavy meat axe or cleaver, inflicting upon her wounds from which she died within a few hours. To the information defendant pleaded not guilty, filing also a special plea in which he alleged that at the time of the alleged commission of the crime charged he was 'insane and mentally irresponsible.' On the trial defendant did not deny that he had made the assault upon his wife, but rested his entire case upon his special plea of insanity and mental irresponsibility,

The trial resulted in a verdict of guilty, together with a finding that the death penalty should be inflicted. From a judgment of guilty entered upon this verdict, directing that defendant be executed, he appeals.

The facts leading up to the tragedy, briefly stated, were as follows: At the time of trial defendant was fifty-six years of age. When twenty-four years old he came to Spokane and went to work in a brewery, being promoted from time to time until he reached the position of foreman. During this period he married, two children being born of the marriage. His first wife dying while his children were still young, appellant married again, losing his second wife after a short period. Appellant then brought up his children himself in such a manner as to reflect credit upon all concerned. His friends and neighbors in Spokane testified on his trial to appellant's good character and to his excellent reputation as a good citizen. In 1912 appellant removed to Walla Walla, where he was employed in a brewery, where he worked steadily up to the time of the killing, most of the time as cellar man. His employment by the two breweries continued from 1897 to March 30, 1929, with the exception of two years, during which the Walla Walla brewery was closed, during which interval appellant was employed at Kennewick by a company engaged in the preparation of grape juice for the market. Appellant owned his own home in Walla Walla, where he, for some time prior to his third marriage, lived alone, his children having established homes of their own. This home was clear from incumbrance, located on a half acre of land, and, in addition appellant had saved a little over $800 in cash. October 1, 1928, appellant went to Seattle to visit his daughter, meeting en route a young man named Al Landers, who, after appellant's return to Walla Walla, called on him, bringing with him one Eva M., or Betty, Beavers, a young woman of immoral character, who, at least at times, indulged in intoxicating liquor to excess, and who was probably, at the time she was introduced to appellant, living with Landers. During the fall of 1928 appellant saw this woman from time to time, and, notwithstanding the fact that he was well aware of her immoral character, he, January 12, 1929, married her upon her promise to behave herself in the future. If the woman ever had any intention of keeping her promise 'to be good,' as stated by appellant, her promises were speedily forgotten, as almost immediately after her marriage she again associated with Landers and conducted herself in a disorderly and outrageous manner. She very soon went to Seattle, where she probably lived for a while with another man, who leaving her stranded, she wrote appellant for money to come home. He sent her the money and she did go to Walla Walla, but remained in town two days before appellant learned of her arrival, he finally discovering her at a hotel in a drunken condition and taking her home. It appears that appellant, either before or after his marriage, had contracted syphilis from his wife, and by the end of March his capital had been reduced to $2. It is evident that he was madly infatuated with Betty, and that he had spent all his money upon her, buying her good clothes and endeavoring to gratify her whims in an effort to cause her to be content to live with him decently as his wife. During this period Betty's dissolute friends frequented appellant's home, leading appellant to drink to excess, arousing his jealousy by the improper liberties which they took with his wife, often before his very eyes, and changing his heretofore regular life into a disordered and dissipated existence, causing certain changes in his character and habits which were noticeable to his friends and associates.

On Sunday, March 31, appellant and his wife were in their home entertaining friends and acquaintances, the revelry continuing well into the evening. At about 9:30 o'clock, p. m. the guests having departed, appellant's wife prepared to leave the house, having received a telephone call from Landers, who had just been released from jail, asking her to come up town, as he wanted to see her. It appears from the testimony that at this time appellant attacked his wife with the cleaver, inflicting upon her seventeen separate wounds, the walls of the house showing the marks of ten or eleven other blows. From the wounds then inflicted upon her, Mrs. Schneider died within a few hours. Appellant, after attacking his wife, went to the home of a neighbor and telephoned a surgeon to come to attend his victim.

Appellant moved for a change of venue upon the ground that he could not receive a fair trial in Walla Walla county because of local prejudice against him. It seems that two other murders had been committed in that county not long prior to the killing of Mrs. Schneider, and appellant contended that, due to this situation, and the fact that the local newspapers had given considerable publicity to his attack upon his wife, together with the fact that she was young and pretty, it was impossible for him to receive a fair trial in his home county. Affidavits were filed by appellant in support of his motion for change of venue, and counter affidavits were filed on behalf of the state. The assault committed upon appellant's wife was a peculiarly brutal and atrocious one. Her body was cut and hacked well nigh to pieces in a most cruel and barbarous manner. Such a crime naturally created considerable excitement in the community in which it occurred, and naturally the published accounts thereof created a good deal of prejudice against the murderer. It does not appear, however, that a situation had resulted which would prevent appellant from receiving a fair trial before an impartial jury. The trial court was in an excellent position to understand the situation, and his ruling upon such a question should not be disturbed upon appeal unless it clearly appears that an erroneous ruling was made, which, it must be presumed, resulted in prejudice to the accused. State v. Schafer (Wash.) 286 P. 833. Careful consideration of the record upon this question satisfies us that the trial court did not err in denying appellant's motion for a change of venue.

Appellant argues that his special plea, in which he pleaded that at the time of the alleged crime he was suffering from 'insanity and mental irresponsibility to such a degree and of such a nature as to render him incapable of having a criminal intent, and that then he was mentally irresponsible,' alleges two distinct mental states, one, that of insanity the other, that of mental irresponsibility, and that the trial court, in its conduct of the case and instructions to the jury, treated 'mental irresponsibility,' as used in the statutes providing for such a plea as that herein made by appellant, as synonymous with 'insanity,' and thereby committed error to appellant's prejudice. Appellant argues that under his plea of 'mental irresponsibility' it was not necessary to show a diseased condition of the mind, which had resulted in complete obliteration of the reasoning faculty, or that under such a plea only two verdicts were possible--one, guilty of murder in the first degree; the other, not guilty by reason of insanity. In other words, appellant seeks to differentiate between 'insanity' and 'mental irresponsibility,' as used in the statutes providing for such a plea in a criminal proceeding, as was here entered by appellant. The statutes providing for such a plea were referred to, and the material portions set forth, in the opinion of this court in the case of State v. Schrader, 135 Wash. 650, 238 P. 617, and in the later en banc decision rendered by this court in the same case, 135 Wash. 661, 243 P. 10. In the special plea interposed by appellant, he specifically alleged 'that said...