State v. Williams
| Decision Date | 20 March 1884 |
| Citation | 18 N.W. 682,63 Iowa 135 |
| Parties | STATE v. WILLIAMS. |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from Warren district court.
The defendant was charged, by indictment, with murder in the second degree, in killing one L. H. Phillips. He was tried, convicted, and sentenced to the penitentiary for 13 years, and he appeals.Phillips & Day and A. C. Bishop, for appellant.
Smith McPherson, Atty. Gen., for the State.
1. The defendant was indicted jointly with A. J. Earl, J. B. Frazier, J. B. Anderson, B. Daughtery, and Seely Smith. The indictment was presented and filed in August, 1881. At the January term, 1882, of said court, J. B. Frazier and A. J. Earl were tried, found guilty, and sentenced to the penitentiary. The defendant was tried separately at the August term, 1882. Before entering upon the trial the defendant presented to the court a petition for a change of venue based upon the alleged excitement and prejudice of the inhabitants of Warren county against him, and the application was overruled, and exceptions taken. The petition was supported by the affidavits of a number of persons, and there were counter-affidavits of a very large number of persons filed by the state. All of the affidavits of the defendant were in general terms. No facts were set out therein showing that there was a state of excitement and prejudice against the defendant in the county. The affidavits on the part of the state were in general terms. Now, while it may not be necessary to set out in the affidavits specially the prejudice and excitement relied upon for a change of venue in order to authorize the court to grant the application, yet, where the showing made is general and is resisted by affidavits upon the part of the state, this court will be slow to interfere with an order denying the change. The record must show affirmatively that there was an abuse of the discretion reposed in the court in determining the matter. We cannot say that the application was erronously overruled. As the state becomes more populous, and the persons qualified to serve as jurors in most of the counties are now so numerous as to count up into thousands, the reasons which existed for changes of venue when the state was sparsely settled have mostly passed away, and the instances are now rare where an impartial jury may not be obtained in any case in any county. It is the source of much unnecessary court expenses, and, when invoked for the purpose of delay, as it often is, it makes an opportunity for most willful and corrupt perjury. We make these observations without any application to the change of venue in this case.
2. L. H. Phillips was a married man, and, with his wife and five children, the oldest being 12 years of age, resided in Warren county. All of the parties who were indicted for his murder were his neighbors. The homes of defendants Williams and Anderson were near to that of Phillips, so that the different members of their families were frequently at each other's homes in a neighborly sort of way. In the fall of 1880 Phillips was arrested, and bound over to answer to a charge of stealing wheat. He gave bond for his appearance to answer the accusation, and the defendant Williams, as his friend, signed the bond as surety. The grand jury ignored the charge. In March, 1881, he was again arrested upon the same charge, and the value of the wheat alleged to have been stolen was fixed at an amount so that jurisdiction of the offense was by law conferred upon a justice of the peace. There was a trial before the justice and a jury, and the jury failed to agree. Another trial was had before the justice. The defendant Williams was a witness in this prosecution. He was summoned by the state, but it does not appear what his testimony was on the trial. The trial lasted two days. He was not at the trial on the first day, but was subpœnaed, and appeared on the second day. After giving his testimony he went home, and the attorney for the prosecution in his argument to the justice reflected severely upon Williams, but in what manner does not appear. Some one went after Williams, and he returned to the place of the trial, and after the close of the arguments, by permission of the justice, he called the attorney to account for his abuse, and wanted to know the reason for it. The attorney referred him to Phillips, and thereupon the defendant expressed some feeling against Phillips in a general way.
In a few days after the trial, and on Tuesday, Phillips left his home for Clarke county. In the evening after he left, his wife told her children that she was going to a creek close by to drown herself, and that she would leave her bonnet on the bank of the creek. She did not drown herself, but went to some of the neighbors, but to which one does not appear, and on Thursday evening she was at Anderson's house. She was claiming that her husband abused and maltreated her and threatened her life, and that she needed protection from him. The neighborhood had been excited by the report that she had drowned herself, and search had been made up and down the creek for her body. A consultation was had with the defendant and others, and late in the evening, after dark, two of the parties went to see the township trustees to have them do something for the protection of the woman. On the next day the trustees met at Anderson's, and found quite a number of persons there. The evidence shows pretty clearly that after the trustees came Anderson sent for the defendant Williams. At all events, Williams came there very soon after the trustees arrived. There was a general consultation as to what should be done, and the conclusion was reached that the trustees had no authority in the matter, and that the best thing to be done was to have Mrs. Phillips go before a justice of the peace and have her husband put under bonds to keep the peace. The defendant took part in this consultation by reading and examining the law, and probably to some extent by conversation. The trustees went away, and there was some talk among the persons who remained about getting up a team and taking Mrs. Phillips to a justice of the peace. In the mean time dinner was prepared,...
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