Tate v. State

1929 OK CR 422, 281 P. 820, 45 Okla. Crim. 96, 1929 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 460
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma
DecidedOctober 5, 1929
DocketNo. A-6823.
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 1929 OK CR 422 (Tate 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
Tate v. State, 1929 OK CR 422, 281 P. 820, 45 Okla. Crim. 96, 1929 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 460 (Okla. Ct. App. 1929).

Opinion

CHAPPELL, J.

The plaintiff in error, hereinafter called defendant, was prosecuted in the district court of Creek county on a charge of murder, the jury finding him guilty of manslaughter in the second degree and fixing, his punishment at imprisonment in the state penitentiary for 2 years.

*97 Defendant was city marshal of the town of Mann-ford in Creek county and claimed to be a deputy sheriff. He at the time of the commission of this homicide was patrolling the state highway, known as the Albert Pike highway in the vicinity of Mannford. The deceased was a young man about 21 years of age who had gone to Tulsa with two of his brothers and three other boys on April 13, 1926, in two Ford roadsters. They were returning to their homes in the neighborhood of Yale in Payne county when this homicide occurred. The theory of the state seems to have been that the deceased and the other boys with him were at most engaged in the commission of a misdemeanor in driving their automobile in a reckless manner and at a reckless rate of speed, and that the defendant was not legally warranted in firing at the driver of the car in order to make arrests or to stop the flight of the parties.

The theory of the defendant was that the deceased and his companions were engaged in the commission of a felony by driving their automobiles on the public highway while intoxicated, and that the defendant, being warned of their approach and of their intoxicated condition, attempted to intercept them and arrest the deceased and his companions, and that the deceased and his companions fled from the officer, and that the officer fired at a rear tire of the car the deceased was riding in, the bullet struck the pavement and glanced upward and struck the deceased, killing him. The defendant contends that he was in the legal discharge of his duty as a public officer and that the killing was accidental, though justified by all the facts in the case. The issue made by the state and the issue made by the defendant were submitted to the jury by the court under proper instructions and the jury found the issues of fact against the defendant.

*98 Defendant complains that the court erred in giving instructions Nos. 4, 5, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, the first, second and third paragraphs of No. 15, and No. 16. It was not mandatory that the trial judge state affirmatively defendant’s theory of the case in any particular instruction. It was sufficient if the court in the general charge covered the defendant’s theory of the case. Instructions 12, 13, and 14, considered together, apply the theory of law of the defense to the evidence of the defense in this case. It is well established that the instructions must be considered and construed as a whole. The charge is not to be condemned because a single paragraph fails to contain all of the law of the case, but the entire charge is to be considered as if it were but a single statement of law, and if, when so considered and construed, it fully and faiirly covers the law of the case, it is sufficient and neither party may justly complain of the incompleteness of any paragraph thereof. McKenzie v. State, 11 Okla. Cr. 554, 149 Pac. 911; Rogers v. State, 15 Okla. Cr. 434, 183 Pac. 41; Mathews v. State, 16 Okla. Cr. 446, 184 Pac. 468; Cole v. State, 18 Okla. Cr. 430, 195 Pac. 901; Ned v. State, 29 Okla. Cr. 389, 233 Pac. 1096; Guerin v. State, 43 Okla. Cr. 172, 277 Pac. 601.

The defendant next contends that the court erred in refusing to give defendant’s requested instructions Nos. A, B, and C. It was not error for the trial court to refuse the requested instructions of the defendant where the general instructions fairly covered the law of the case. Manning v. State, 7 Okla. Cr. 368, 123 Pac. 1029; Hawkins v. State, 24 Okla. Cr. 82, 216 Pac. 166; Hamilton v. State, 38 Okla. Cr. 62, 259 Pac. 168.

The defendant next complains that the court erred in admitting the evidence of the witness Ralph Morey and *99 one Burt, concerning certain experiments made by them in firing the pistol used by the defendant and loaded with leaden bullets in the public highway at approximately the point where the evidence showed this killing occurred. These tests were made to indicate the height to which the leaden bullets would ricochet when fired from said gun at said pavement at different distances from a canvas covered board set upright upon the pavement. The particular objection now urged to the admission of the testimony of these witnesses was that they were not experts in the use of firearms, and that the experiments were not made under like conditions on like materials with similar apparatus and under like circumstances as existed at the time of the homicide. The witness Morey was permitted to testify without any objection having been made by defendant’s counsel. It was not until the witness Burt was testifying that counsel first objected to this line of evidence. The witness Morey detailed the conditions under which these experiments were made; the witness Burt giving the result of such experiments as taken down by him at the time. All of this evidence was introduced in rebuttal. The defendant had called one Harry Brill, an alleged rifle expert, who testified in answer to certain hypothetical questions put to him by defendant’s counsel as to the probable results of the courses of bullets fired into a pavement from a pistol at different distances, and also testified to the results of certain experiments made by him with a pistol on a pavement in Tulsa county many miles from the scene of this homicide. Counsel for the defendant first opened the door to an investigation of this kind and laid the foundation for rebuttal evidence of the state along the same lines. Neither the witness Morey nor Burt were asked or expressed any opinion as to how the defendant shot the deceased; that is, whether the bullet *100 tiiat killed the deceased, in their opinion, ricocheted from the pavement or went directly from the pistol into and through the back of the automobile and into the back of the neck of deceased. These witnesses were only permitted and only testified to the facts of the conditions under which these tests were made and identified the physical evidence of the results of such tests. The evidence given by them was not the opinion evidence of experts. This, was experimental and not expert evidence and the inferences to be drawn from the physical results of such experiments introduced in evidence were left to the jury and not to the witnesses.

In Irby v. State, 18 Okla. Cr. 671, 197 Pac. 526, this court in passing upon similar questions said:

“Evidence of experiments made out of court, and not in the presence of the jury, is admissible upon the same principle that the experiments themselves may be conducted in the jury’s presence. * * * Where the competency of evidence of experiments depends upon similarity of circumstances and conditions, the question is one for the court to determine. * * * If the evidence shows that the experiments were made under circumstances approximately similar to those which surrounded the original transaction and such experiments would serve to shed any light upon that transaction, it would be admissible, althongh such experiments might not have been made under exactly similar conditions as attended the original transaction.

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Related

State v. Lumley
1947 OK CR 25 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1947)
Needham v. State
1934 OK CR 43 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1934)
Skelton v. State
1931 OK CR 173 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1931)
Collier v. State
1930 OK CR 221 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1930)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
1929 OK CR 422, 281 P. 820, 45 Okla. Crim. 96, 1929 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 460, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/tate-v-state-oklacrimapp-1929.