Watson v. State
| Decision Date | 16 February 1903 |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
| Parties | JONATHAN E. WATSON v. STATE OF MISSISSIPPI |
October 1902
FROM the circuit court of Calhoun county. HON. WILLIAM F. STEVENS Judge.
Watson appellant, was indicted for the murder of one Andrew Ashley was tried and convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to the penitentiary for a term of five years, from which conviction and sentence he appealed to the supreme court. At the March term, 1902, on the first day of the term, the case was called and the state announced itself ready for trial. Appellant's witnesses were called, and it was discovered that one of his material witnesses, named Stewart, was not present. The clerk produced a certificate from a practicing physician to the effect that the absent witness was sick with smallpox. He had been duly subpoenaed. Appellant asked for compulsory process to compel the attendance of said witness which the court refused, remarking that, even if process could be served, the witness would not be permitted to come into the courtroom with smallpox. Appellant then made a motion for a continuance because of the absence of said witness, and filed his affidavit, in which he set forth that he expected to prove by said witness that, on the morning of the difficulty between defendant and Ashley (deceased), the witness met Ashley and one Ivey, and they asked witness if he had seen defendant, and witness replied that he had, and Ashley then remarked, "The damned scoundrel thinks he will get away from us, but I will show him;" that said witness is the only witness not related to affiant by whom he can prove any threats made by deceased. The district attorney then agreed to admit that the absent witness would testify to the matters set forth in the affidavit if he were present, and the court overruled the motion for a continuance. On the trial defendant's wife and mother testified as to threats made by deceased against defendant. The view of the case taken by the court makes it unnecessary to set out any further facts in the case.
Reversed and remanded.
Mitchell & Fletcher, for appellant.
The witnesses, both for the state and the defendant, by their direct and cross-examination, show that they are not of the best class of citizenship, and each was related in some way or other either to appellant or the deceased, Ashley. Therefore it became all-important that some reputable, disinterested witness, one who was not related to either of the parties to the difficulty, should have thrown light on the question as to who was the aggressor in the difficulty.
The whole question in the case was this: who was the aggressor in this difficulty? If appellant could have shown by the testimony of disinterested witness that deceased had, about an hour before the difficulty, threatened the life of appellant, such testimony would have been invaluable in arriving at the solution of the main question. The whole object of introducing threats is for the purpose of determining that one vital question, and this court has held time after time, that they are admissible for this purpose, whether...
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