Woods v. State
| Decision Date | 19 December 1900 |
| Citation | 60 S.W. 244 |
| Parties | WOODS v. STATE. |
| Court | Texas Court of Criminal Appeals |
Appeal from district court, Live Oak county; M. F. Lowe, Judge.
Abe Woods was convicted of theft, and he appeals. Reversed.
Lon. C. Hill and Chas. H. Mayfield, for appellant. Robt. A. John, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
Appellant was convicted under an indictment charging him with being an accessory to the crime of theft, and his punishment assessed at two years' confinement in the penitentiary, and he prosecutes this appeal.
Motion was made to quash the indictment on the ground that it did not state the facts constituting the alleged acts of defendant in the escape of Bicente Chavez, his alleged principal in the theft. In support of this contention, we are referred to Street v. State (Tex. Cr. App.) 45 S. W. 577. Counsel in his brief concedes that said case was decided upon another point, yet he relies upon certain dicta in the decision to the effect that the indictment in that case was not only defective in failing to allege want of knowledge of the crime of the principal on the part of the accessory, but the opinion of the court further suggests that an indictment charging an accessory with an offense should set forth the act or acts done by him in aid of the principal offender, and not merely state the legal conclusion that such parties did, etc. The question here presented was brought directly before the court in Gann v. State (Tex. Cr. App.) 57 S. W. 837, and we there held it was not necessary to set forth the means by which the accessory after the fact rendered aid to the principal in effecting his escape. The court did not err in overruling the motion to quash.
By bill of exceptions No. 1 he questions the action of the court permitting state's witness George Schrier to testify concerning a conversation between appellant, Abe Woods, and himself, about a month before Christmas, 1897. Said conversation was evidently a suggestion on the part of the defendant made to the witness to steal a bunch of cattle, and that they could make a thousand dollars in one night, and in that connection Steve Tullis was mentioned as a man whom appellant would trust. It was not stated what cattle appellant referred to, and nothing was said about the Bronson cattle, which are involved here. This testimony was objected to, because irrelevant and inadmissible, and appellant was not on trial charged with the theft of any cattle, and because said statement was made before any conspiracy to steal the Bronson cattle. The testimony, however, was admitted. If this had been a transaction referring to the theft of the Bronson cattle, and a part of that transaction, it might have been admissible as testimony against appellant in this case, tending to show his motive in effecting the escape of Chavez, who, it seems, was ultimately charged with the theft of the Bronson cattle, which theft is the basis of this prosecution. But the bill does not show that the conversation had any relation to the theft of the Bronson cattle. There is a possibility that these cattle were the cattle alluded to, but we do not think the mere possibility that said conversation may have referred to the Bronson cattle would be sufficient. The bill should have shown with some degree of certainty that the theft of the Bronson cattle was referred to. The testimony, isolated as is was, and not connected with the case, was calculated to show appellant was a bad man, and was proposing some time before the theft of the Bronson cattle to steal cattle.
Appellant complains that in the cross-examination of Jack O'Donnell, witness for state,...
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