State v. Trout
| Decision Date | 26 May 1888 |
| Parties | THE STATE v. TROUT |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Decided May, 1888
Appeal from Woodbury District Court.--HON. C. H. LEWIS, Judge.
DEFENDANT was convicted of the crime of murder in the first degree committed on or about the third day of July, 1886, in Sioux City, by shooting one Edward Hatch. The shooting by defendant, and the death of Hatch as a result thereof, are not denied; but it is claimed that defendant was insane when he fired the fatal shot, and that, therefore, he should have been acquitted. A motion for a new trial was overruled, and judgment rendered requiring that defendant be imprisoned in the state penitentiary at Anamosa for life at hard labor. Defendant appeals.
AFFIRMED.
J. N Weaver, for appellant.
A. J Baker, Attorney General, for the State.
This case was submitted on a voluminous transcript of the record, without an abstract, without any assignment of errors or argument of counsel, and with the citation of but a single authority. In this condition of the case, we have examined the record with care, for the purpose of ascertaining what errors, if any, had been committed in the district court, and the grounds upon which defendant relies for a reversal of the judgment.
I. The defendant asked the court to give the jury the following instruction:
"While, in this case, the sanity of the defendant at the time of shooting Hatch, the deceased, is presumed by the law, and the burden of proving insanity rests upon defendant, still if you believe from the evidence that, at the time of such shooting, it is probable that defendant was insane, then the presumption of sanity is overcome, and defendant is entitled to an acquittal."
The court refused this instruction, but charged the jury as follows:
"When the state shows beyond reasonable doubt, in the first instance, that the defendant is guilty, then defendant comes to his plea of insanity; and, when he comes to rely upon such plea, then, under the law, he is required, in order to excuse his act on account of the alleged insanity, to show, by a preponderance of the evidence,--that is, by the greater weight of credible evidence in the case,--that he was insane."
Other portions of the charge, which we need not set out, further explained the paragraph quoted. The charge given was as favorable to defendant as was the instruction he asked. In legal effect, if a claim is made...
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