State v. Daly

109 S.W. 53, 210 Mo. 664, 1908 Mo. LEXIS 81
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedMarch 31, 1908
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 109 S.W. 53 (State v. Daly) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Daly, 109 S.W. 53, 210 Mo. 664, 1908 Mo. LEXIS 81 (Mo. 1908).

Opinion

BURGESS, J. —

On the 12th day of February,. 1907, the grand jury of the city of St. Louis returned an indictment against the defendant, charging Mm with murder in the first degree. . The indictment was in two counts, the first of which charged that the defendant gave to one Robert Harvey a large quantity of morphine mixed in a glass of beer, which said beer and morphine the said Harvey drank, and from the effects of which he died. The second count charged that the defendant gave to one Robert Harvey a large quantity of morphine mixed in a glass of beer, wMoh said Harvey drank, and that the defendant then struck, beat, kicked and wounded the said Harvey in the chest and body, inflicting certain mortal wounds and fractures of the ribs, and from the effects of said morphine and wounds so administered the said Harvey died. The defendant was put upon trial on March 22, 1907, and convicted of murder in the first degree under the first count of the indictment. Defendant’s motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment having been overruled, he appealed.

The evidence for the State tended to prove that the defendant was known by two names, Frank Daly and A. O. Biles, and that he resided in the city of St. Louis. The deceased was an engineer, and lived with his family at Osage City, Missouri. For several days prior to the 9th day of November, 1906, the de[671]*671ceased and the defendant had been visiting a saloon-known as the Ohio saloon, on the southwest corner of' Market and Seventh streets, in St. Louis, and- had been drinking considerably. On the afternoon of said day, the deceased, the defendant and one Joseph Brown were sitting at a table in said saloon, drinking beer, the deceased usually paying for the drinks-A dispute arose between the deceased and the waiter as to whether or not he, the deceased, had paid for three bottles of beer which he had ordered and. which had just been brought to the table by the waiter. Having been assured that the beer had not been paid for, the deceased got up from the table, pulled a roll of bills out of his pocket and handed the waiter a. five-dollar bill to pay for the beer. While the deceased was doing this, the defendant and Brown were-sitting at the table watching him, and the defendant,, when he saw the bills, “nudged” Brown in a significant way, calling his attention to the money. The-deceased returned to the table and sat down, but immediately got up and went to the toilet room. As soon as he had left the table, the defendant asked Brown for a dime, saying, “I know where I can make a piece of coin.” Brown gave him a dime, and the defendant said, “I will go and get some morph.” -He left the saloon and came back in about five minutes. In the meantime the deceased had returned from the toilet room, and was sitting at the table. The deceased and Brown each poured out a glass of beer from the bottles ordered by the former. Daly, however, did not do so just then, but took his empty glass and held it under the table, and Brown noticed him making some peculiar motions with his hands as if trying to put something into the glass. Brown kept talking to the deceased, who did not appear to notice what Daly was doing. The defendant,, while the others were talking, poured beer into this glass and man[672]*672aged to exchange his glass for that of the deceased, who had not yet drunk his glass of beer and whose attention was attracted in a direction away from the table by Brown. The defendant then said, “Here goes,” and all three drank. After drinking, the defendant poured the remainder of the contents* of his bottle and that of the deceased into one glass, passed it over to the deceased and said, “Drink it up,” and the deceased did so. Some more beer was drunk, and all laughed and sang, but the deceased seemed “funnier” than previously and his throat soon got weak. The three men left the saloon, walked south on Seventh street to Clark avenue and turned into an alley, where the deceased, who appeared to be much muddled, sat or fell down. He got up, and again fell down. His companions took hold of his arms, raised him up and walked west on Clark avenue with him as far as Eighth street, where the deceased sat down in a doorway.. He appeared to be in a stupor, and acted as if under the influence of an opiate, and had not spoken from the time he left the saloon. The defendant and Brown assisted him to his feet, and the three then went south on Eighth street as far as Spruce street, where there was a vacant lot, into which they went, and there the deceased sat down, his head bent forward. Daly and Brown went out to the street to see if anybody was approaching, and then returned to where deceased was sitting. The defendant then grasped the deceased around the neck and threw him back flat on the ground, put his knee on deceased’s neck, and both defendant and Brown went through the pockets of the deceased, the defendant taking all the money' of the deceased, and Brown taking two knives and a package of tobacco from deceased’s pockets. After robbing the deceased, the defendant stooped down and struck him with something on the breast or stomach, and made the remark to Brown [673]*673that “it would keep him from squealing.” Before leaving, the defendant picked up a new John D. Stetson black hat worn by the deceased, and both men proceeded to Crouse’s pawn shop, where they sold the hat for $1.50. They then went to a saloon and took a • drink, and afterwards the defendant divided the booty with Brown, the former stating that he got $1.50 out of deceased’s pockets. After boarding a Market, street car, both men began talking about what they had done, and the defendant said, “I gave that son-of-a.-bitch enough morphine to kill a man.” After defendant and Brown had been arrested, and Brown had confessed and pleaded guilty to the charge against him, the defendant walked by Brown’s cell, and, referring to Brown’s statement or confession which defendant had read in a newspaper, he said, “You go on up there and go for ninety-nine years; they can’t do nothing with you as you got your sentence; you go on there and take it all on you, and I can beat it. I will send you a couple of dollars a week while you are in the penitentiary.”

Theodore Young, who ran a drug store at No. 600 Market street, testified that about 6:50 o’clock on the evening of November 9th the defendant visited his drug store and bought ten cents worth of morphine. He was asked by Mr. Young what he wanted to do with it, and the defendant said he was an habitual user of morphine. Mr. Young told him he would have to register his name on the poison register. The defendant gave his name as Frank Daly, and after securing.the morphine he left the store.

Joseph Crouse, a pawnbroker at No. 9 South 6th street, testified that the defendant and another man came to his place of business at ten minutes before eight o’clock on the evening of November 9th, and sold him a John D. Stetson hat for $1.50-, which hat was identified as the hat worn by the deceased.

[674]*674Officer Butler testified that on the' morning of November 10, 1906, at seven o’clock, he found a man on a vacant lot, near the corner of Eighth and Spruce streets; that the man was unable to speak and that his pockets were all turned inside out. Witness said that he appeared to be thoroughly chilled, as “his skin was sort of purple.” After taking him to the city hospital, and deceased had been given a bath, witness asked him to give his name, and he said “Harvey,” and then said he lived at Osage City, but while witness was asking these questions the deceased did not open his eyes.

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Bluebook (online)
109 S.W. 53, 210 Mo. 664, 1908 Mo. LEXIS 81, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-daly-mo-1908.