Walker v. State

Alabama Court of Appeals

Walker v. State

81 So. 179, 17 Ala. App. 3, 1919 Ala. App. LEXIS 35

CourtAlabama Court of Appeals

DecidedJanuary 14, 1919

Docket5 Div. 293.

StatusPublished

Cited by3 cases

This text of 81 So. 179 (Walker v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Alabama Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook

Walker v. State, 81 So. 179, 17 Ala. App. 3, 1919 Ala. App. LEXIS 35 (Ala. Ct. App. 1919).

Pincite

Opinion

BROWN, P. J.

[1] In prosecutions for a violation of the prohibition laws, the statute provides that the prosecution—

“may be begun by affidavit as well as by indictment, and that when begun by affidavit, the person charged shall not have the right to demand that a Grand Jury shall prefer indictment for the alleged offense, but the prosecution may continue no matter in what court or before what judge the trial shall be had upon the affidavit upon which it was originally begun." Acts 1915, p. 32, § 32.

Therefore the filing of the complaint, as provided by section 6730 of the Code of 1907, was not essential to the regularity of the proceedings in the circuit court. Captain v. State, 10 Ala. App. 167, 64 South. 639; Leo v. State, 10 Ala. App. 191, 64 South. 637.

[2] The court did not abuse its discretion in denying the defendant’s application for a continuance oh the ground that Luster, who was jointly indicted. with the defendant for the same offense, after severance, had been tried and convicted before a jury selected from the panel for the week; it appearing that all the jurors on the jury that tried Luster were excused from the panel, at the defendant’s instance, before the jury for his trial was selected. '

[3] After the prosecution had offered evidence tending to show that defendant and Luster were confederates in the illegal operation of the still, it was permissible for the state to show by Richardson that Luster, in the absence of defendant, went with the witness, and got the jug of “wild cat” whisky near, the still. This was independent evidence, not in the nature of a confession, tending to prove the'corpus delicti. The declarations of Luster while in this act were excluded by the court.

There was ample evidence to justify the submission of the case to the jury, and the affirmative charge was properly refused.

No error appearing on the record, the judgment is affirmed.

Affirmed.

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