State v. O'Day

175 So. 838, 188 La. 169, 1937 La. LEXIS 1251
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedJune 21, 1937
DocketNo. 34342.
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 175 So. 838 (State v. O'Day) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. O'Day, 175 So. 838, 188 La. 169, 1937 La. LEXIS 1251 (La. 1937).

Opinions

PONDER, Justice.

The defendant, Jack O’Day, was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to the penitentiary for a term of 6 years and 6 months to 20 years. The defendant appeals from the conviction and sentence.

During the trial, nine bills of exception were taken to the court’s ruling by the defendant’s counsel.

Bill of exception No. 1 was taken to the court’s ruling permitting the taking of testimony at the scene of the crime.

The defendant contends that the court was without right to permit the taking of testimony of witnesses, to permit the jury to perform an experiment, and to permjt the introduction of physical objects in evidence at the scene.

The per curiam of the trial judge to this bill reads as follows:

“This Bill was taken to the ruling of the Court, which permitted certain witnesses to testify at the scene of the crime. *173 The bill recites that the Court was in session at the scene of the crime; that all the officers of the Court, as well as the Jury, the defendant and his counsel, and the prosecuting attorneys were present. The Bill does not object to the visit to the scene, but objects to the taking of testimony at the scene. The scene was visited and testimony taken on motion of the State. All of the witnesses who testified at the scene of the crime with one lesser exception had already testified in full as State witnesses in the court room.

“The Court concurred with the State in the belief that it was necessary for a proper understanding of the evidence, and that the Jury may have a fair and better opportunity to pass upon the credibility of certain material witnesses, that the Jury be permitted to visit the locus of the crime, to-wit: the immediate rear of the L. & A. R. R. passenger depot, New Orleans.

“At the scene, the State recalled the witnesses in question, to-wit: one Leonard Cline, one Henry Hoffstadt, one Henry Viot, one Paul Salvaggio, and one Simon Palanque, and had them point out at the scene of the crime certain objects and places, the position of the automobile of appellant in which the deceased was shot; the place where her body was found, some forty feet from the car; the projecting water pipe anchored appellant’s car to the spot and made it impossible for him to drive it from the scene, after the homicide; a view from the position of the water pipe, through the passenger station proper, revealing the uptown portion of the witness Salvaggio’s business place on the opposite side of S. Rampart Street, facing the station, and as stated,' visible from the spot where the water pipe showed through the station, immediately before the fatal shot was fired.

“Appellant drove his car into the station premises from Saratoga Street. There is no vehicular passage way on the Railroad property, except two railroad train tracks. Pillars support a small shed extending the length of the rear portion of the station.

“A proper understanding of many vital and necessary facts, made a visit to the scene by the Court and jury a necessity, and only sworn and competent witnesses pointed out objects and positions and elucidated their testimony to the Jury at the scene. One witness testified at the scene, who had not previously testified in the Court room, to-wit: one Simon Palanque, an attache of the District Attorney’s office, who was sworn and called upon to step off the distance between the water pipe and Saratoga Street, that the record might show what the Jury could see.

“This Bill also objects to the taking of testimony (in the presence of the Jury, the appellant and his attorneys, the prosecuting attorneys, the Court and all the attaches of the Court) in the basement of the Criminal Court building, where the Ford V-8 coupe of appellant which had been taken from its anchorage to the water pipe in the L. & A. Station by the police, was wrapped and sealed, and preserved and stored, to be used as evidence in the case.

*175 “The deceased Ethel Hughes was shot once, • the bullet entering the skull on the left side behind the left ear, travelled through the brain and made its exit on the right upper and forward temporal region of the head. This fact, plus the existence of some strands of hair, some hits of bone and some fragments of brain tissue, which the bullet forced against the right hand front top corner of appellant’s coupe and which were not removed by the authorities from the automobile, showed conclusively that the deceased was shot after she had half risen from the seat of the automobile, half turned from the driver of the automobile, and was in the act of stepping out of the automobile, and making her exit from the coupe, just as the witnesses saw her attempting to do on South Rampart Street prior thereto. Because there were no witnesses to the shooting itself which occurred at 1:05 A. M. in this dark, lonely and deserted place, the defense properly took the advantage and gave the Jury to understand that it was encumbent upon the State to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that O’Day did not act in self-defense. The physical facts above stated showed conclusively that the woman was not shot by a person in self-defense.

“The exact spot of the interior of the car to which the hair, bone and tissue adhered, as well as the existence of the hair, bone and brain tissue at that place, was evidence delicate to handle, and a fact indispensibly necessary to the State’s case. The best evidence, and as far as the Jury was concerned, the most satisfactory proof of this indispensible fact, and other equally necessary facts was the ocular demonstration of the car to the Jury. This portion of the appellant’s coupe was not detachable and could not be brought into the court room. The court building construction made it impossible to bring the vehicle to any other place in the court building except the basement where it was. These considerations are emphasized because this Court believes that this bill of exception eloquently demonstrates how fatal to the cause of justice would be such a principle as appellant contends for.

“This Court respectfully believes that it was a matter of necessity as well as intelligent procedure that witnesses point out to the Jury the particular part of the automobile to which the evidence adhered; to have the Jury see for themselves how well the body of the car had been sealed to preserve the evidence in its interior, and consequently how genuine was this evidence, to have witnesses show where, ip the interior of the car, the fatal'bullet was recovered and other material features of the case so necessary for the Jury to have accurate knowledge of. * * * ”

The defendant admits that it was in the discretion of the court to permit the jury to view the scene but objected to any evidence being taken at the scene.

There is no form of legislation in Louisiana that provides that the jury may be taken to the scene or to take testimony at that place. While on the, other hand there is no form of legislation thaf prohibits it. The purpose of a trial is to ascertain the truth. It is impossible to bring the locus into the court and introduce it *177 in evidence. It is now well recognized, and there is no dispute herein raised to the contrary, that courts may take the jury to view the scene.

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Bluebook (online)
175 So. 838, 188 La. 169, 1937 La. LEXIS 1251, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-oday-la-1937.