Williams v. State

• Decision Date: 26 April 1954
• Docket Number: No. 39139,39139
• Citation: 72 So.2d 147,220 Miss. 800
• Parties: WILLIAMS v. STATE.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

Page 147

72 So.2d 147

220 Miss. 800

WILLIAMS v. STATE.

No. 39139.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

April 26, 1954.

A. T. Patterson, W. W. Brown, Calhoun City, for appellant.

J. P. Coleman, Atty. Gen., by William E. Cresswell, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.

ETHRIDGE, Justice.

Appellant, Mrs. Jewel Williams, was convicted in the Circuit Court of Calhoun County of arson, first degree, under Code of 1942, Sec. 2006, which provides that 'any person who wilfully and maliciously sets fire to or burns or causes to be burned or who aids, counsels or procures the burning of any' designated building, shall be guilty of arson in the first degree. She was sentenced to serve a term of two years in the state penitentiary. On this appeal we consider only two points, since they will dispose of the case. The evidence was wholly insufficient to support a conviction, and appellant should have been granted her requested peremptory instruction. Some detailed analysis of the testimony is necessary in order to demonstrate our reasons for these conclusions.

Appellant is a white woman sixty-three years of age. She is a widow, her husband having died several years prior to the fire in question. For about twenty-one years she has owned a small building on the southeast corner of the square in Calhoun City, facing north. The front part of this building is of brick construction, and was used as a cafe, operated by Mrs. Williams. The east and south sides of the building, of wood construction, contained five bedrooms and a bath. These were added by appellant to the original brick structure a number of years ago. The fire occurred around 11 P.M. on Sunday night, December 7, 1952. Apparently the building, particularly the living quarters in the rear, was substantially damaged by the fire.

The State's case was based upon the testimony of two principal witnesses, Miss Gene Davis and Glenis Coker. Miss Davis testified that she had been working as a waitress in the Williams Cafe for about three months prior to the fire. She lived in a room in the cafe building. She said that Mrs. Williams had one of those rooms, Miss Neamy Wooten, a sister of appellant, occupied another, the witness occupied a third and the other two were rented to Fred Sheffield and Lloyd Vance. On the Sunday night in question she left the cafe about 6 or 6:30 P.M., at which time Mrs. Williams was there. She returned about 9 or 9:30 P.M., and saw some newspapers on the floor in the bathroom and on the front door of the cafe. She asked appellant about the papers, and appellant replied that she had done that a number of times. The witness stated that she thought that she would go to bed, but Mrs. Williams said no, that she was not going to stay there that night and told the witness not to remain over night. The witness then started to go out the back door, and Mrs. Williams told her to go to the front. The building was heated by natural gas, and Miss Davis had never seen any coal oil in it. During the three months Miss Davis was working at the cafe, she said that appellant came in a number of times and carried things up to Memphis, including her clothes. She said that she saw appellant the day after the fire, and on that and a number of other occasions after the fire, appellant told her if someone came to see her about the fire, to tell them that she did not know anything about it.

Miss Davis stated that she had asked apellant to let her off that night, and appellant had agreed; and that whenever she stayed at the cafe at night, with one exception, either appellant or Miss Neamy, appellant's sister, would be there. At the time of the fire Miss Neamy had been in Memphis for several days. There was no shade over the glass front door, only the newspaper. She said that during the period she was working there appellant made a number of trips to Memphis, where her daughter-in-law and grandson lived. Appellant's son had died several years before the fire. Miss Davis said that the general understanding was that appellant was living in Memphis; that she was away for some little time, and for part of this period Mrs. Barker had charge of the cafe for Mrs. Williams, and for part of this period the witness would run the cafe, and Mrs. Williams would come back on weekends to see about it; and that Mrs. Williams had told her a number of times that she was broke.

The other principal witness for the State was Glenis Coker, a white man thirty-eight years of age, who lived near Calhoun City. He cannot read or write. Coker testified that on December 7, 1952, he was living at the home of Shine Collins, apparently a short distance out of Calhoun City; that on that Sunday night he and Collins came to town, met Mose Sheffield in their truck, and left and got some whiskey, which they drank, and they then went back to town. They parked on the side of the street and 'Mose told Shine he wanted to talk to me a little bit.' The jury was then retired, and the testimony to be hereinafter quoted was presented to the court in the jury's absence. Appellant made proper objections, which were overruled. Coker was permitted to testify before the jury as follows:

'By: District Attorney:

'Q. Glenis, I believe when the jury left you were testifying about Shine Collins leaving the truck and Mose said something to you, what did he want you to do? A. To go and get some coal oil.

'Q. Why did he want you to get it? A. Mrs. Williams was going to give him $200.00 to burn the building.

'Objected to his stating what someone wanted him to do, but state what he said.

'By the Court: That is right, state what was said or done.

'By: District Attorney:

'Q. What did Mose tell you about Mrs. Williams, if anything? A. He told me she wanted the place burned.

'Q. And what would she give him to burn it? A. Two hundred dollars.

'Q. And what did he tell you? A. That she would give me ten dollars and he would give me one dollar to go and get the oil.'

The trial court ruled that this testimony was admissible as being part of the 'res gestae', and that anything that happened that night concerning the crime is 'part of the res gestae regardless of who said it * * *'.

Coker further testified that he went down to a filling station and purchased some coal oil, and also bought some more whiskey. He carried the coal oil through the back door of the Williams building. Sheffield stepped outside for a few minutes, and Coker lay down on the bed. Sheffield came back in and told Coker to get up and go on out to the truck, which he did. Coker said as he was leaving he stepped on some newspapers on the floor, upon which there was coal oil, with a pretty strong odor; and that he also saw oil on the bed. He stated that he did not see Mrs. Williams leave the building. Sheffield told him not to say anything about what had occurred. He, Sheffield and Collins left in the truck together. He said that when they left the cafe, Mrs. Williams was there. He was not able to place the time of night or when he, Sheffield and Collins left the cafe, but said it was 'getting pretty late' and that it was 'probably late in the night.' He denied that while he was there around 9 P.M. a man came to the door and asked him where Mrs. Williams was, and denied that he told the man that she was up at her sister's, Mrs. Hyde's home. He did not talk to Mrs. Williams, and did not know of any conversation with her by Sheffield or Collins. Coker said he was not drunk but was drinking.

The city marshal testified that two weeks after the fire he found a five gallon tin can on the ground immediately behind the small bathroom in the dwelling part of the house. He did not know whether the can was there before the fire or whether it was placed there after the fire. The only part of the building burned close to the floor was in the extreme back room. The balance of the fire's destruction seemed to be from about two feet from the floor up to the ceiling. There was a clothes cleaning establishment about ten feet to the east of the Williams Cafe. Two witnesses for the State testified that the fire was rather an odd one, in that it would burn awhile at the back, and when that would seem to be pretty well extinguished, the fire would move to the front, and that while they were fighting the fire that night, the odor of kerosene in the building was strong. Appellant had fire insurance in the amount of $8,000 on the building, and $2,000 on its contents.

For the defense, Mrs. Jewel Williams testified that when she was in town she occupied a bedroom east of the cafe area; that she had been back home from Memphis in active charge of the cafe for about a week; that prior to that time and since September she had been staying in Memphis with her grandson, four and one-half years of age, and her daugher-in-law. She closed the cafe that Sunday night around 6 P.M. and stayed there until 8 P.M., during which period she was cleaning the place up. Another woman was helping her, but she was unavailable at the trial. Mrs. Williams said that Miss Davis did not work on that Sunday, and that the last time she saw her that night was about 8 o'clock. She put the papers over the door to keep people from coming in while she was working. She had put papers in the bathroom for sanitary purposes. There were no papers spread on any other floors. She denied that she burned, or caused anyone else to burn, the building; and denied that she had any conversation with Sheffield or anyone else about burning it. She said that one Spencer had offered her $10,000 cash for the cafe about two months before it burned. She said that she left the building about 8 P.M. and went to the home of her sister in Calhoun City, Mrs. Hugh Hyde, where she remained until 2 A.M., Monday morning, when she was taken to the hospital. She was at Mrs. Hyde's house when her sister, Miss Neamy, her grandson, and Sam Huffstickler of Memphis arrived at the Hyde's home at about 9 P.M. that Sunday night. They had driven down from...