Sykes v. State
| Decision Date | 09 March 1908 |
| Docket Number | 12,970 |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
| Parties | DAVID SYKES v. STATE OF MISSISSIPPI |
FROM the circuit court of Monroe county, HON. EUGENE O. SYKES Judge.
Sykes appellant, a negro, was indicted and tried for the murder of another negro, George McIntosh, was convicted, sentenced to the penitentiary for life, and appealed to the supreme court.
The case was before the supreme court on a former appeal, and was remanded to the court below for a new trial. Sykes v State, 89 Miss. 766, 42 So. 875. On the second trial appellant was again convicted, mainly on the testimony of Mattie McIntosh, wife of the deceased, whose testimony was in direct conflict with former testimony delivered by her on appellant's preliminary trial. At the time of appellant's second trial, she had been convicted and sentenced to a term of five years in the penitentiary as an accessory after the fact to the murder of her husband, the deceased. The verdict of the jury, upon which appellant was sentenced to a life term in the penitentiary, was as follows "We, the jury, find defendant guilty as charged, but cannot agree as to punishment, but do agree to ask the mercy of the court."
Reversed and remanded.
D. W. Houston, for appellant.
Unless the court takes into consideration the testimony of the woman, Mattie McIntosh, the judgment of the court below must be reversed, for it is almost solely upon her testimony that the jury returned the verdict of guilty. Her testimony should, however, be considered as unworthy of belief in a case as serious as this. She had been arrested, soon after the homicide of her husband, but subsequently released; she had testified on a former trial that she did not know anything about the killing, and yet she now testifies that appellant killed the deceased with an axe as he lay asleep, and that the blow of the axe awakened her, and that she then helped appellant bury the dead body. She herself was indicted for the murder of her husband and pleaded not guilty. Subsequently she withdrew her plea and entered a plea of guilty to "being accessory after the fact." In other words, she turned state's evidence to protect herself, and was given a light penitentiary sentence. And then she testified against appellant, and on the testimony of this woman the jury returned their verdict. Such testimony should not support a verdict of guilty. Dill v. State (Miss.), 38 So. 37.
It was error in the trial court not to require the jury to clear up their peculiar verdict. Smith v. State, 75 Miss. 543, Penn v. State, 62 Wis. 450. See also Owen v. State, 82 Miss. 19, 33 So. 718; Avant v. State, 88 Miss. 226, 40 So. 483.
R. V. Fletcher, attorney-general, for appellee.
This case was tried on practically the same testimony as was adduced on the former trial, and twice have impartial juries pronounced appellant guilty. It is inconceivable that two separate juries should find similarly without good grounds existing under the law and evidence to support the verdict.
The proof of appellant's guilt is direct and clear; the wife of the deceased testifying to the whole story of the revolting crime....
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