State v. York

• Court: Missouri Supreme Court
• Writing for the Court: Leedy
• Citation: State v. York, 142 S.W.2d 91 (Mo. 1940)
• Decision Date: 03 July 1940
• Docket Number: No. 37012.,37012.
• Parties: STATE v. YORK.

142 S.W.2d 91

STATE v. YORK.

No. 37012.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 2.

July 3, 1940.

Appeal from St. Louis Circuit Court, Division No. 12; Robert L. Aronson, Judge.

Clara York was convicted of manslaughter and prior conviction, and she appeals.

Affirmed.

Roy McKittrick, Atty. Gen., and J. F. Allebach, Asst. Atty. Gen., for respondent.

LEEDY, Judge.

Appellant, a colored woman, was charged by indictment in the Circuit Court of the City of St. Louis with murder in the second degree, in having stabbed and killed one Marie Sims (likewise colored) on April 11, 1938. For the purpose of bringing the case within the provisions of Sec. 4461, R.S.1929 § 4461, Mo.St.Ann. § 4461, p. 3063, known as the Habitual Criminal Act, it was alleged that appellant had been previously convicted of manslaughter, sentenced and imprisoned therefor, and discharged upon lawful compliance with said sentence. The jury found her "guilty of manslaughter and prior conviction" and assessed her punishment "at ten years." She was sentenced to a term of ten years in the state penitentiary, and in due course appealed. We have not been favored with a brief in her behalf, and, accordingly, treat the grounds of the motion for a new trial as her assignments of error on this appeal.

I. The principal point made is whether there was sufficient evidence to support a conviction for manslaughter, her contention being that the evidence did not show any of its elements. The position is not tenable, as the facts in brief outline will disclose.

The killing occurred in the late afternoon following a quarrel or series of quarrels between the principals which had taken place in a shoe shining parlor and soft drink place located on Chouteau Avenue and operated by one Bill Mosby. It appears that the subject of the quarrels was a man, or "some fellow" as one of the witnesses put it. During the course of the controversy deceased, Marie, called appellant, Clara, "a red headed whore," to which Clara retorted with a like charge. This culminated in Mosby ordering Marie and a companion, Clifford Moss, out of the place. Clara was kept inside. Marie, Moss and one Willie Moore stood in front of the place and talked for 15 or 20 minutes. Marie and Clifford Moss then walked through a gangway at the side of the shoe shining parlor and walked back into the alley in the rear. When they arrived in the alley, Marie and Moss stopped to talk, and shortly thereafter the appellant and one Willie Maude Moore (a woman) also came back into the alley. The deceased and Moss did not know appellant was going to follow them. Clifford Moss and Willie Maude Moore began talking with each other, and appellant and the deceased resumed their conversation about fifteen feet away from them. As to this scene in the alley, witness Lulu Butler testified as follows:

"A. Marie said, `You think you're bad, don't you,' she said to Clara, and I heard Clara say, `I'll show you how bad I am,' and just that quick, I saw her stab her.

"Q. Did you see anything in Clara's hand? A. I saw a knife."

Clifford Moss also happened to turn and saw appellant stab the deceased over the left breast with a knife. He saw no knife or weapon of any kind in the possession of the deceased. The appellant and Willie Maude Moore left the scene together immediately after the stabbing and Moss carried the deceased to a corner drugstore where medical aid was summoned. After the stabbing, the appellant went back to the shoe shining parlor and told Bill Mosby that the deceased had waylaid her and they had fought it out in the alley. Appellant handed the knife, which was identified as the one used in the stabbing, to Mosby, who handed it to Willie Moore (a man) immediately afterwards. The knife belonged to Willie Moore and deceased had borrowed it from him on Saturday, April 9, 1938, that is, two days before the stabbing occurred.

The deceased died shortly after the stabbing although the record does not show the exact time of her death. A post mortem examination was held at 8:30 P. M. of the same day, that is, April 11, 1938, and it shows the cause of death as an internal hemorrhage, from stab wound of left lung.

Witness John Troy, godfather of the deceased and with whom deceased lived, met the appellant ten or fifteen days before the stabbing and talked with her. The appellant told him at that time "you tell that Marie that I am going to kill her the first chance I get." This threat he communicated to Marie. He stated further that he knew there had been trouble between appellant and deceased for eight or nine months before the stabbing.

It was shown that appellant had been previously convicted of manslaughter, sentenced to six months' imprisonment in the City Workhouse, duly imprisoned...