Curtis v. State

46 S.W.2d 303, 119 Tex. Crim. 398, 1931 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 154
Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas·Decided November 25, 1931·No. No. 14414·Published·Cited by 4 cases

Opinions

CHRISTIAN, Judge.

The offense is murder; the punishment, confinement in the penitentiary for six years.

Appellant and A. B. Mallow lived on adjoining places. A division fence between their property had been the cause of several quarrels between the parties. On the occasion of the homicide A. B. Mallow, Pennington Mallow (deceased), and Orville Mallow, who Were the sons of A. B. Mallow, went to the fence for the purpose of cutting a ditch along .its side, on Mallow’s property. A. B. Mallow was engaged in clearing weeds along the fence. He had set the weeds on fire. Touching the fatal difficulty, the state’s testimony was, in substance, as follows: Appellant approached the fence and asked A. B. Mallow what he was going to do. Mallow replied that he was going to dig a ditch in order to take care of the water that was running over his land. At this time appellant was 25 or 30 feet from Mallow. Appellant took Mr. Mallow to task for having set fire to the grass, stating to him that the smoke made his wife sick. Mr. Mallow replied that his wife had come out and helped the boys fight the fire and it did not make her sick. Appellant said: “You are just a damn liar,” and pulled a pistol out of his coat pocket. Seeing that he was going to shoot him, Mr. Mallow turned his back toward appellant. Appellant said: “I have been waiting to get you for a long time” and fired a shot at Mallow, which took effect in his arm. At the time the shot was fired Mr. Mallow was 25 or 30 feet from appellant. After shooting Mr. Mallow in the arm appellant fired a shot at Pennington Mallow, deceased, who was 25 or 30 feet from his father. Deceased fell to the ground mortally wounded, and died in approximately ten minutes. Appellant then fired a shot at Orville Mallow. This shot did not take effect. The wife of A. B. Mallow, upon [402]*402hearing the shots, ran to the scene of the difficulty. Appellant fired two shots at Mrs. Mallow as she approached, and then turned and walked away.

Appellant testified, in substance, that when he saw the fire he believed that his fence was burning and went to the scene of the homicide to see about it; that when he spoke to Mallow about the fire damaging the fence, Mallow cursed him, calling him a G— d— lying s— of a b — ; that he replied that Mallow was a dirty liar; "that Mallow then started toward him, with a hoe in his hand, saying “I will kill you”; that Mallow struck at him and he dodged; that Mallow made a demonstration as if to cross the fence; that the division fence was between him and Mallow; that when Mallow came toward the fence as if to cross it, he drew his pistol and fired, believing that Mallow was going to kill him; that Mallow had theretofore made threats against his life; that he did not see Orville Mallow or deceased, and fired no shots at either of them; that he fired all of the shots at A. B. Mallow in self-defense; that he and deceased were on friendly terms, and he had no intention of shooting him, and did not know at the time that one of the shots he fired struck deceased. Appellant and his witnesses testified to threats A. B. Mallow had made against his life.

Bill of exception No. 1 recites that appellant presented a motion to the court before any evidence was introduced asking that the district attorney be instructed to refrain from introducing any evidence as to what was said by deceased and the members of his family at the scene of the homicide after deceased had been shot and during the time he was dying. It was averred in the motion that the testimony the state would seek to introduce threw no light on the issues to be decided, and would serve no purpose other than to influence the minds of the jury. It was alleged in the motion that it would be undisputed that appellant killed deceased by shooting him with a pistol. The court overruled the motion. There is nothing in the bill of exception to show that the testimony the state would seek to introduce was inadmissible. If the testimony was relevant and material, the fact that appellant admitted he killed deceased would not authorize appellant to determine the method to be employed by the prosecuting attorney in developing the state’s case.

Bill of exception No. 2 presents the following occurrence: The mother of deceased wept while giving her testimony. After testifying that she went to the scene of the homicide immediately after deceased had been shot, she stated that deceased said to her: “Mr. Curtis (appellant) has killed daddy and he is going to kill you, go back.” The witness testified further: “And Mr. Mallow hollered ‘For God’s sake go back, he is going to shoot you’, and I went on to Pennington (deceased), and when I got to him he fell in my arms and was so large, he knocked me down and we all went down together and Mr. Mallow was down on [403]*403his feet and hands crawling.” Appellant -objected to the testimony of the witness on the ground that it was irrelevant, prejudicial, inflammatory and not pertinent to any issue in the case; and on the further ground that the declarations of deceased constituted an opinion. Another ground of objection was that said declarations were not made in the presence and hearing of appellant. It is not certified in the bill of exception that appellant was not present. If appellant was present all of the testimony of the witness would appear to have been admissible. Taylor v. State, 89 Texas Crim. Rep., 112, 229 S. W., 552. The mere statement of the ground of objection that appellant was not present, is not a certificate of the trial judge that the facts forming the basis of the objection were true. Branch’s Annotated Penal Code, sec. 209; Fuller v. State, 50 Texas Crim. Rep., 14, 95 S. W., 541. The occurrence testified to by the witness was res gestae. It is unnecessary to determine whether the opinion of deceased that appellant was going to shoot his mother, being res gestae, was properly admitted. A part of the declaration of deceased was that appellant had killed his father. Appellant shot deceased’s father shortly before he shot deceased. As far as the bill of exception reflects the matter, the declaration to the effect that appellant had killed deceased’s father was admissible. If the declaration that appellant was going to kill the mother of deceased was inadmissible, — and this is not conceded, — it is observed that appellant’s objections were leveled at all of deceased’s statements. A part of the statement being admissible and there being nothing in the objections to directly challenge or single out the inadmissible declaration, the bill of exception is too general to be appraised. Branch’s Annotated Penal Code, sec. 211; Payton v. State, 35 Texas Crim. Rep., 510, 34 S. W., 615. The opinion is expressed that the bill of exception fails to reflect reversible error. See Simpson v. State, 97 Texas Crim. Rep., 57, 263 S. W., 273; Claxton v. State, 109 Texas Crim. Rep., 345, 4 S. W. (2d) 452.

It is recited in bill of exception No. 3 that deceased’s father was permitted to testify that deceased died in his lap. We are unable to reach the conclusion that the bill of exception reflects error. Deceased died ten minutes after he was shot. It was incumbent upon the state to prove his death. It was not improper to prove that he died in his father’s lap. Claxton v. State, supra; Simpson v. State, supra. The details of deceased’s death were a part and parcel of the transaction which resulted in the homicide.

Bill of exception No. 7 recites that the court declined to permit appellant- to prove by his wife’s deposition that it was more than an hour after the difficulty before she learned that deceased had been shot, and further, that she learned such fact from some of the neighbors.

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Curtis v. State, 46 S.W.2d 303, 119 Tex. Crim. 398, 1931 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 154 (Tex. 1931).

46 S.W.2d 303 (Curtis v. State) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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