Cole v. State

1931 OK CR 204, 298 P. 892, 50 Okla. Crim. 399, 1931 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 190
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma
DecidedApril 25, 1931
DocketNo. A-7993.
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 1931 OK CR 204 (Cole v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Cole v. State, 1931 OK CR 204, 298 P. 892, 50 Okla. Crim. 399, 1931 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 190 (Okla. Ct. App. 1931).

Opinion

CHAPPELL, J.

Plaintiff in error, hereinafter called defendant, was convicted in the district court of Seminole county of the crime of murder, and his punishment fixed by the jury at death.

The state charged that on the 24th day of March, 1930, the defendant and ohe Prank Hunt murdered Ernest Irby. A severance was taken, and Cole was tried first. Hunt afterward pleaded guilty, and his punishment was fixed at imprisonment in the state penitentiary for the term *400 of his natural life. In the trial of the case at bar, Hunt turned, state’s evidence and told a complete story of the cause, the motive, the steps taken, and the circumstances surrounding the commission of the crime.

The evidence of the state was that in the latter part of March, 1930, there was pending in the'United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma a prosecution against the defendant, the deceased, and one Tom Woods, in which they were charged with conspiracy to violate the federal prohibitory laws. The deceased and Woods had made sworn statements to the federal officers acknowledging their guilt of the crime and implicating the defendant therein. The evidence of the state was that this killing, was the outgrowth of the prosecution in the federal court, and that the motive for the taking of deceased’s life was the desire on the part of the defendant to get rid of deceased as a witness against him in the federal case.

The witness Hunt testified that he was a lawyer located in Tulsa; that he met the defendant in the fall of 1929; that they became intimately acquainted and bosom associates; that defendant told Hunt about the indictment in the federal court and that he was promised a position with the Sun-Ray Oil Company that would make him $18,000 or $20,000 a year, but he could not get the position until he got out of the trouble that he was in in the federal court; that, knowing Hunt was a lawyer, he consulted with him about how to get rid of the case in the federal court; that defendant borrowed $400 and Hunt and defendant went to see Irby and Woods and tried to persuade them to change their testimony or to leave the state; that they went to Shawnee and consulted Park Wyatt, an attorney there, upon the question of what effect it would have on their case if deceased and Woods failed *401 to appear; that defendant and Hunt went to Wewoka and saw Irby, and he refused to change his testimony or to leave the country; that they thereupon decided to kill him; that they induced the deceased to go with them to Lake Wewoka, where they shot and killed him; that, after shooting him, they wired a heavy piece of pipe to the body and towed it out into the middle of the lake and sunk it; that after deceased disappeared from his home on the evening of March 24, 1930, in company with the defendant, and upon his failure to show up the next day, the wife of deceased got into' communication with defendant and was informed that the deceased had gone to Arizona, and would return some time in the future; that he was all right and for them not to worry about it; that, at the time this conversation was had with Mrs. Irby, the deceased had been murdered and his body sunk in Lake Wewoka; that after the homicide was committed they went back to Shawnee, and there called Attorney Wyatt over the phone in order to establish their alibi; that they went back to Wewoka the next day and from there to Ok-mulgee, where the case in the federal court was continued as to' defendant because of the failure of deceased to appear against him; that on the 10th day of April, 1930, the caretaker at Lake Wewoka, in Seminole county, discovered floating in said lake the body of a man in an upright position, with one arm waving in the breeze; this caretaker took a boat and went out into the middle of the lake and towed the body in, and then notified the officers ; that this body was afterwards identified as the body of Ernest Irby, the deceased, who had been engaged in the drug business in the city of Wewoka, and who had disappeared from that city in company with defendant about 17 days prior thereto ; that an examination of the body revealed that deceased had been shot in the head prior to the sinking of the body in Lake Wewoka; that de *402 fendant and Hunt were arrested soon after the discovery of the body.

Defendant admits having a conversation with the wife of deceased and telling her that her husband was in Arizona, but said he did so because Hunt had told him the deceased had gone to Arizona. The defendant, testifying for himself in the trial, admitted practically everything that Hunt testified to as to their various whereabouts, the consultation with Attorney Wyatt, and other things as to which Hunt was corroborated, but denied that he had anything to do with the procuring of the pistol, the shooting of the deceased, or the sinking of his body in Lake Wewoka. Defendant testified that on the evening of March 24, 1930, he left Hunt with the deceased in the city of Shawnee, Okla., giving' Hunt $300 with which to send Irby out of the state, and that defendant then went on to Oklahoma City and stayed at the Lawrence Hotel the night of March 24th; that later he met Hunt, who told him that Irby had gone to Arizona; that Hunt had given the $300 that defendant had given him to Irby; that the first he knew that Irby was dead was on the 10th day of April, when Hunt read to' him an account of the discovery of the body while they were in a room in a hotel.

Defendant contends, first, that the trial court erred in admitting incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial testimony which tended to show that the defendant was guilty of separate crimes disconnected with the crime for which he was being tried.

It is earnestly contended that the evidence of the indictment of the defendant in the federal court and of the circumstances surrounding this indictment were inadmissible, for the reason that such evidence tends to establish other crimes independent of the one upon which defendant was being tried.

*403 The state contends that the admission of evidence of other offenses was proper in this case because the evidence tending to show the guilt of the defendant of other offenses also tends to show the motive for the commission of the homicide, that this offense was directly the outgrowth of the fact that defendant had committed the other offenses testified to, and that at that time he stood charged with its commission in the federal court of the Eastern district of Oklahoma.

As a general rule, evidence of other offenses is not admissible for the purpose of showing that the defendant is guilty of the particular offense charged. But to this general rule there are certain well-settled exceptions. One of these exceptions is that evidence of another offense is relevant and admissible when it tends to prove some element of the offense charged, as when it tends to show guilty intent or motive of the offense charged. Smith v. State, 3 Okla. Cr. 629, 108 Pac. 418; State v. Rule, 11 Okla. Cr. 237, 144 Pac. 807.

In Dumas v. State, 19 Okla. Cr. 413, 201 Pac. 820, this court said: “It is a general rule in criminal prosecutions that evidence of any offense other than that for which the prosecution is had is inadmissible.

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Chandler v. Denton
741 P.2d 855 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1987)
Keller v. State
1982 OK CR 159 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1982)
Jones v. State
1975 OK CR 222 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1975)
Roulston v. State
1957 OK CR 20 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1957)
Doser v. State
1949 OK CR 16 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1949)
Michelin v. State
1939 OK CR 56 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1939)
Quinn v. State
1932 OK CR 206 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1932)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
1931 OK CR 204, 298 P. 892, 50 Okla. Crim. 399, 1931 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 190, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/cole-v-state-oklacrimapp-1931.