State v. Brinte

58 A. 258, 20 Del. 551, 4 Penne. 551, 1904 Del. LEXIS 63
CourtDelaware Court of Oyer and Terminer
DecidedMay 27, 1904
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 58 A. 258 (State v. Brinte) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Delaware Court of Oyer and Terminer primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Brinte, 58 A. 258, 20 Del. 551, 4 Penne. 551, 1904 Del. LEXIS 63 (Del. Super. Ct. 1904).

Opinion

Grubb, J.,

charging the jury :

Gentlemen of the jury :—In this indictment Walter Brinte and John Jiner, alias John Joiner, the prisoners at the bar, stand charged with murder of the first degree, for the felonious killing, with express malice aforethought, of John R. Taylor, in the month of January of the present year, at Wilmington hundred, in this county. The first count of the indictment charges that the death of the said Taylor was caused by mortal wounds inflicted by Walter Brinte by the means and in the manner described therein, whilst the said John Jiner was aiding and abetting the said Brinte as his accomplice in committing said felonious assault; the second count charges that the death of Taylor was caused by mortal wounds inflicted by said Jiner whilst Brinte was aiding and abetting Jiner as his accomplice in the crime; and the third and last count of the [560]*560indictment charges that the death of Taylor was caused by mortal wounds inflicted by each and both of said prisoners.

A statute of this state provides that “every person who shall abet, procure, command or counsel any other person or persons, to commit any crime, or misdemeanor, shall be deemed an accomplice and equally criminal as the principal offender, and shall be punished in the same manner and with the same punishment.” (Rev. Code, 1852, Chap. 133, Sec. 1). Therefore, if the jury is satisfied that either of the prisoners inflicted said mortal wounds, it is sufficient for the conviction of the other, who was, if you so find from the evidence, aiding and assisting in the felonious assault upon Taylor the one who actually inflicted them, because, in contemplation of law, it becomes the act of each and all of those who were co-operating and participating in the perpetration of the crime then and there committed.

Under any indictment for murder of the first degree, the jury may find the accused guilty of either murder of the first or second degree, or of manslaughter, according as the law and the evidence may warrant; but, unless they shall find the accused guilty of one of these three grades of homicide, they must acquit, and render a general verdict of not guilty.

Homicide is the killing of any human creature, and is of three kinds—justifiable, excusable,-and felonious.

Felonious homicide, at common law, is of two kinds, namely, murder and manslaughter, the difference between which consists principally in this : that in murder there is the ingredient of malice, whilst in manslaughter there is none, for manslaughter, when voluntary, arises from the sudden heat of the passions, but murder from the wickedness and malignity of the heart. Therefore manslaughter is defined to be the unlawful killing of another without malice, either express or implied, and without premeditation.

Murder is where a person of sound memory and discretion unlawfully kills any human being under the peace of the State, with malice aforethought, either express or implied. The chief [561]*561characteristic of this crime, distinguishing it from manslaughter and every other kind of homicide, and therefore indispensably necessary to be proved, is malice preconceived or aforethought. This term, malice, is not restricted to spite or malevolence toward the deceased in particular, but, in its legal sense, it is understood to mean that general malignity and recklessness of the lives and personal safety of others which proceed from a heart void of a just sense of social duty and fatally bent on mischief. Malice is implied by law from every deliberate, cruel act committed by one person against another, no matter how sudden such act may be. For the law considers that he who does a cruel act voluntarily does it maliciously.

Under the statute laws of this State (Rev. Code, 1852, Chap. 127, See’s 1-2), there are two degrees of murder, namely, murder of the first and murder of the second degree. The first is where the crime of murder is committed with express malice aforethought, or in perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate any crime punishable with death; and the second degree is where the crime of murder is committed otherwise, and with malice aforethought implied by law. Express malice is proved by evidence of a sedate, deliberate purpose and formed design to kill another; and such purpose and design may be shown from the circumstances attending the act, such as the deliberate selection and use of a deadly weapon, knowing it to be such, stealthily lying in wait, preconcerted plans, or the previous procurement or preparation of instruments, contrivances, or other means for slaying or doing great bodily harm to the deceased victim. These, however, are but some of the instances, given for the sake of examples or illustrations, in which the external or attending circumstances will evidence the sedate, deliberate mind and formed design to kill, or to do the party killed some bodily harm, for whenever in any other instance the attending circumstances evidence such a mind and design to do the act, and death ensues, it constitutes, in law, express malice aforethought, and murder of the first degree, under the statute, and is punishable with [562]*562death, as where one, either from motives of hatred or revenge, or with a view to rob him of his money or get possession of any other thing about his person, eooly and deliberately forms the design in his mind to kill another, or wound and disable him for that purpose, and commits the act, either by lying in wait for him, or in any other manner, and his death ensues as the consequence of such bodily injury, it is likewise murder with express malice aforethought, and of the first degree, under the statute.

State vs. Goldsborough, Houst. Cr. Cas., 314.

Implied or constructive malice is an inference or conclusion of law from the facts found by the jury; and, among these, the actual intention of the prisoner becomes an important and material fact for, though he may not have intended to take away life or to do any personal harm, yet he may have been engaged in the perpetration of some other felonious or unlawful act from which the law raises the presumption of malice. It is the difference between express and implied or constructive malice aforethought which distinguishes murder of the first from murder of the second degree, except, however, that under our statute murder of the first degree may be committed when the malicious killing is done in perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate any crime punishable with death, as rape or arson is in this State, although from such a felonious act malice is merely implied or presumed by law. Therefore murder of the second degree is held to be proved where it is not satisfactorily shown by the evidence submitted to the jury that the killing was done with a deliberately formed design to take life, or in perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate any crime punishable with death, but is so shown that it was done suddenly, without justification or excuse, and without any provocation, or without provocation sufficient to reduce the homicide to the grade of manslaughter, or was done in perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate a felony not capitally punishable, or any unlawful act of violence from which the law raises the presumption of malice.

[563]

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

State v. Bowen
336 A.2d 228 (Superior Court of Delaware, 1975)
Jenkins v. State
230 A.2d 262 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1967)
Downing v. State
55 Del. 438 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1963)
State v. Pritchett
173 A.2d 886 (Superior Court of Delaware, 1961)
Burton v. State
149 A.2d 337 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1959)
Wilson v. State
109 A.2d 381 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1954)
Brown v. State
105 A.2d 646 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1954)
Pitts v. White
103 A.2d 245 (Superior Court of Delaware, 1954)
Schwartz v. State
185 A. 233 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1936)
State v. Carey
178 A. 877 (Delaware Court of Oyer and Terminer, 1935)
State v. Harris
134 A. 693 (Delaware Court of Oyer and Terminer, 1923)
State v. Shaw
94 A. 434 (Supreme Court of Vermont, 1915)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
58 A. 258, 20 Del. 551, 4 Penne. 551, 1904 Del. LEXIS 63, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-brinte-deloyerterm-1904.