Fox v. State

144 S.W. 516, 102 Ark. 393, 1912 Ark. LEXIS 68
CourtSupreme Court of Arkansas
DecidedFebruary 19, 1912
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 144 S.W. 516 (Fox v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Fox v. State, 144 S.W. 516, 102 Ark. 393, 1912 Ark. LEXIS 68 (Ark. 1912).

Opinion

Hart, J.

On the 26th day of August, 1909, Mrs. Carrie Winkleman was killed and robbed in the city of Fayetteville, Washington County, Arkansas. She was accustomed to carry $8,000 or $10,000 in a bustle on her person, and was robbed and killed to secure her money. The evidencé tended to show that the crime was committed by Gus Sartin. The defendant was indicted for the crime of accessory before the fact to robbery. He was tried before a jury, found guilty, and his punishment assessed at three years in the State penitentiary.

The indictment (formal parts omitted) is as follows:

“The grand jury of Washington County, in the name and by the authority of the State of Arkansas, accuse N. H., alias ‘Red,’ Fox, of the crime of accessory before the fact to the crime of robbery committed as follows, towit: that one Gus Sartin in the said county of Washington, in the State of Arkansas, on the 26th day of August, 1909, unlawfully, feloniously, and violently did by force and intimidation take from the person of Carrie Winkleman the sum of ten thousand dollars in money, gold, silver and paper money, current money, in the State of Arkansas, of the value of ten thousand dollars, the personal property of the said Carrie Winkleman. And the said N. H., alias ‘Red,’ Fox, not being present aiding, abetting and assisting, in said county of Washington in the State of Arkansas, on said 26th day of August, 1909, and before said crime of robbery was committed by said Gus Sartin, as aforesaid, unlawfully and feloniously did advise, and encourage the said Gus Martin to commit said crime of robbery, as aforesaid, against the peace and dignity of the State of Arkansas.”

1. It is insisted by counsel for appellant that the court erred in not sustaining their demurrer to the indictment. They insist that the indictment only alleges that at some time and place not in Washington County, Arkansas, the defendant advised and encouraged Gus Sartin to commit the crime. While the indictment is susceptible of this meaning, it would be a strained construction to place upon it. We think that the indictment in plain terms alleges that the defendant, not being present aiding, abetting, and assisting, did, in the county of Washington in the State of Arkansas, unlawfully and feloniously advise and encourage the said Gus Sartin, etc. Therefore, the indictment alleges that he was in said county and State, and aided and encouraged the commission of the crime before it was committed.

2. It is urged by counsel for appellant that the court erred in refusing to discharge him upon his motion for the reason that he was not brought to trial before the end of the second term of the court having jurisdiction of the offense, which was held after the finding of the indictment. He bases his contention on section 2313 of Kirby’s Digest. If it be conceded that the statute is mandatory, before a defendant would be entitled to his discharge for want of prosecution, he must have placed himself on record in the attitude of demanding a trial, or at least resisting a postponement. Dillard v. State, 65 Ark. 404; Stewart v. State, 13 Ark. 720. Here the defendant was.admitted to bail, and did not either demand a trial or resist the order for a continuance. The court was correct in refusing to dismiss his case for want of prosecution.

3. The third assignment of error in defendant’s motion for a new trial is that the court erred in admitting certain testimony which was alleged to be prejudicial to the rights of the defendant. Under this assignment the defendant complains of the introduction of the testimony of James Izgregg, a witness, who testified at the trial of this defendant in the Washington Circuit Court on the charge of accessory before the fact to the murder of Carrie Winkleman. It was proved at the trial that the witness had since died. The defendant agreed that, in the event the court should hold that the testimony was competent, the testimony taken by the stenographer at the previous trial should be read as his evidence, and agreed that the testimony as transcribed by the stenographer from her shorthand notes was a true and correct statement of his evidence taken upon the former trial.

It is contended by counsel for defendant that the testimony is not competent because it was taken under a different indictment and in a different case. We do not think that the objection is well taken. The record shows that the testimony was taken under an indictment charging the defendant with the offense of being accessory .to the murder of Mrs. Carrie Winkle-man,. and the present indictment charges him with being ac-. cessory to the crime of robbery of Carrie Winkleman. The robbery and the murder were all parts of the same transaction, and were committed by the same persons at the same time for the same purposes. The identity of the issues was complete, and-there can be no well founded reason why the testimony taken on the first trial should not. be read as evidence on the second trial where it appears that the witness is dead. This precise question has not been passed on by the court, but in the case of Poe v. State, 95 Ark. 172, where all our earlier cases bearing 6n this question are cited, the court held: “Where an absent witness in a felony case is dead, beyond the jurisdiction of the court, or upon diligent inquiry can not be found, what such witness had previously testified upon the examining trial of the defendant may be proved at the trial of the case, provided the defendant was present at the examining trial, and had the opportunity of cross examination.”

The reason given by the court in so holding was that the defendant was present and had a right and the opportunity to cross examine the witness. The general rule in such cases is that it is not necessary, in order to admit the testimony, that it should have been given on the trial of a case in the exact technical shape for the second action, or that the parties should be identically and nominally the same with those on trial of the first action. The true test in regard to the admissibility of such evidence where the issues are substantially the same is, did the party who is to be affected by it have the power to cross examine the witness and the opportunity to do so? The issues in the two cases were substantially the same, and the parties were the same. As far as the testimony given by Izgregg is concerned, it may be said that it related to the same issue in both cases, and was competent for the same purpose in both cases. The parties in both cases were the same, and the testimony was admitted for the same purpose, and to establish the same issue in both cases. Both indictments arose from the same facts, and the defendant, as we have seen, had the opportunity to cross examine the witness on the first trial. The witness having died since the first trial, we hold that his testimony, taken on-the first trial, is competent. Cox v. State, 28 Tex. App. 92; 1 Greenlead, Ev. (16 ed.) § § 163-4; 16 Cyc. 1095; Ency. of Ev. vol 1, p. 915-18; Charlesworth v. Tinker, 18 Wis. 663. The testimony tended to show that Gus Sartin committed the murder and robbery. Izgregg testified: “I live in Sulphur, Oklahoma. Before the murder and robbery of Mrs. Carrie Winkleman, I heard Fox and Sartin in conversation.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
144 S.W. 516, 102 Ark. 393, 1912 Ark. LEXIS 68, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/fox-v-state-ark-1912.