Kell v. State

1931 OK CR 514, 6 P.2d 836, 53 Okla. Crim. 45, 1931 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 526
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma
DecidedNovember 28, 1931
DocketNo. A-8137.
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 1931 OK CR 514 (Kell 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
Kell v. State, 1931 OK CR 514, 6 P.2d 836, 53 Okla. Crim. 45, 1931 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 526 (Okla. Ct. App. 1931).

Opinion

CHAPPELL, J.

The plaintiff in error, hereinafter called defendant, was convicted in the district court of McClain county of the crime of manslaughter in the first degree in the killing of Wilbur Hopkins, and his punishment fixed by the jury at imprisonment in the state penitentiary for seven years.

The alleged crime was committed on the 7th day of August, 1930. Judgment was pronounced on the 5th day of November, 1930, and the appeal filed in this court on the 24th day of April, 1931.

The evidence of the state was that the deceased was sitting in his home, in the evening, with his back to a window, reading a paper; that defendant walked up to the window with a shotgun in his hand, saw the deceased sitting in the room, observed to see that no one was in line of the gun fire, and stooping down he fired a shot into the back of deceased’s head, which produced instant death.

The defense was insanity produced by knowledge recently acquired of immoral relations between deceased and defendant’s wife.

It is first contended that the trial court erred in overruling the application of the defendant for a continuance *47 of the trial. This application is based on the evidence of one of defendant’s witnesses named Dixie Harrell.

It is set out in the affidavit that the absent witness would testify that the deceased, at a picnic in Blanchard, in 1928, offered to pay her money to have illicit intercourse with him; and further that she would testify that she was acquainted with the reputation of deceased and that such reputation was bad.

This offered testimony was absolutely incompetent. The fact — if it be a fact — that deceased had offered this witness money for an immoral purpose, and that his reputation for morality was bad, would constitute no defense to this defendant under the laws of this state.

Defendant in his brief cites State v. Murray, 88 Kan. 148, 110 Pac. 103. In that case the court says, in paragraph 2 of the syllabus:

“Held, the details of the person’s licentious conduct with other women, as related by himself and others to the defendant, were not material. Held further, than an offer of the defendant to show by a woman, who was a witness, that the person assaulted had tried to seduce her was properly denied.”

The other authorities cited by defendant are based upon the statute in the state where the case arose, or else they do not support defendant’s contention.

In January v. State, 16 Okla. Cr. 166, 181 Pac. 514, 515, this court said:

“The so-called unwritten law, ‘the right to avenge wrongs done a female member of a defendant’s family by killing the wrongdoer,’ does not exist in this state.”

The killing of deceased by defendant because of the wrong done the defendant’s wife constituted no defense *48 to the killing, and evidence that the deceased was a man of immoral character, or had sought to have immoral relations with other women, was incompetent.

The trial court did not err in overruling this application for continuance.

It is next contended that the trial court erred in sustaining the objection of the state to the questions propounded to some of the jurors upon their voir dire examination.

This contention is not supported by the record. In addition to this, the record shows that a jury of twelve good and lawful men was impaneled, chosen, and sworn to try the case. The record nowhere discloses that any objectionable juror was forced upon the defendant, or that any of the jurors whose partial examination is contained in the record sat upon the trial of the case. The record does not disclose that the defendant had exercised all of his peremptory challenges. If defendant procured a fair and impartial trial, that was all he was entitled to.

It is next contended that the court erred in excluding the evidence of Eva Kell, the wife of defendant.

This assignment of error relates to- the refusal of the trial court (out of the hearing of the jury) to first permit the wife of defendant to detail to the jury the numerous instances when she had had sexual intercourse with the deceased, and' then to further testify that she had told her husband about these matters on the night before the killing. The fact that deceased had had sexual intercourse with the wife of defendant was immaterial, and would form no defense to- the killing of deceased, and the fact that defendant was told these matters was only competent to the issue of insanity. January v. State, supra.

*49 The wife was an incompetent witness to a communication with her husband, not in the presence of others. Section 2699, C. O. S. 1921; Tingley v. State, 16 Okla. Cr. 639, 184 Pac. 599; Steeley v. State, 17 Okla. Cr. 252, 187 Pac. 821.

It appears from the record that Mrs. Kell was permitted to and did testify to the fact that she repeated what she had told her husband the night before the killing,, the next morning to her brother-in-law and sister, Mr. and Mrs. John Bayliss, and defendant was present at that time. In that conversation Mrs. Kell admitted intimacy and illicit sexual intercourse with the deceased, and therefore everything that Mrs. Kell told her husband in private afterwards got to the jury, so that defendant could not have been prejudiced in the least by the ruling excluding the details of a communication between husband and wife, not in the presence of third persons.

“The exclusion of evidence to prove particular facts is not prejudicial, if the facts sought to be proved are otherwise proved by competent evidence, and it is apparent that the evidence excluded would not have changed the result.” Addington v. State, 8 Okla. Cr. 704, 130 Pac. 311; Rogers v. State, 9 Okla. Cr. 277, 131 Pac. 941; Hawkins v. State, 24 Okla. Cr. 82, 216 Pac. 166.

It is next contended that the court erred in giving instruction No. 9. It is contended that this instruction is erroneous in that it, in effect, places an undue burden upon the defendant to offer proof of his insanity sufficient to raise a reasonable doubt of his sanity in the commission of the homicide. It is contended that this is not a proper statement of the law, in that it overlooks the fact that if the evidence on the part of the state is sufficient to raise a reasonable doubt of his sanity, no burden then rests upon the defendant to raise such reasonable doubt.

*50 Technically, the instruction is probably defective in this respect. But when the instruction is considered in the light of the evidence, it cannot be held to be prejudicial to the substantial rights of the defendant. There is nothing in the testimony on the part of the state that would tend in any manner to present even a suspicion of the defendant’s insanity.

In Morris v. State, 4 Okla. Cr. 233, 111 Pac. 1096, this court said:

“Although an instruction may not be technically correct, yet, if the evidence is of such a character that the defendant could not have been injured thereby, the error will not authorize a reversal of the judge.”

Section 2822, C. O. S.

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Related

Byars v. State
1934 OK CR 153 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1934)
Lemke v. State
1934 OK CR 46 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1934)
Harris v. State
1932 OK CR 6 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1932)

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Bluebook (online)
1931 OK CR 514, 6 P.2d 836, 53 Okla. Crim. 45, 1931 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 526, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kell-v-state-oklacrimapp-1931.