Case ID: sw_262/html/0753-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "LATTIMORE, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

RHODES v. STATE.
    (No. 8421.)
    (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.
    May 14, 1924.
    Rehearing Denied June 18, 1924.)
    1. Criminal law @=5520(1) — Promises of officers held not to affect admissibility of accused’s statements and confession under arrest.
    Where officers raiding defendant’s home induced him, by promises of light sentence,' to expose several buried stills showing evidence of use, his statements to them leading to such discovery and his subsequent confession of guilt while under arrest, verified by such evidence, were admissible against him.
    2. Criminal law @=>537— Statements induced by promises, but found to be true, held admissible against accused.
    If accused makes statements relative to crime charged found to be true, and which conduce to establish bis guilt, they are admissible, regardless of whether he be under arrest, unwarned, or induced to make them by promises or threats.
    3. Criminal law @=o696(l) — In prosecution for manufacturing refusal to strike out part of confession that defendant sold liquor held not erroneous.
    In prosecution for manufacturing intoxicants, refusal to strike out part of confession stating that defendant made the liquor to sell and sold it in a certain town held not erroneous.
    4. Criminal law @=>295 — Burden of establishing identity of offenses on one pleading former acquittal.
    One pleading former acquittal has burden of establishing identity of offense of which acquitted with that involved in instant case.
    5. Criminal law @=>295 — Evidence held to support jury’s finding against former acquittal for same offense.
    Testimony showing that accused committed offense involved several times within limitation period held to sustain jury’s finding against plea of former acquittal for same offense.
    6. Criminal law @=>829(4) — Refusal of charge covered by main charge held, not reversible error.
    Refusal of special charge relative to plea in bar, fully covered by the main charge, held not reversible error.
    7. Criminal law @=>982 — Refusal to charge law of suspended sentence, where accused over 25, proper.
    Refusal to charge law of suspended sentence was proper, where accused was over 25 years of age.
    8. Criminal law @=>814(3) — Plea In bar unsupported by testimony properly omitted from charge.
    A plea in bar, unsupported by testimony, held correctly omitted from the charge.
    Appeal from District Court, Milam County; John Watson, Judge.
    Henry Rhodes was convicted of manufacturing intoxicating liquor, and he appeals.
    Affirmed.
    Chambers, Wallace & Gillis, of Cameron, for appellant.
    Tom Garrard, State’s Atty., and Grover C. Morris, Asst. State’s Atty., both of Austin, for the State.
   LATTIMORE, J.

Appellant was convicted in the district court of Milam county of manufacturing intoxicating liquor, and his punishment fixed at one year in the penitentiary.

Officers went to appellant’s home and found therein mash and a small quantity of whisky; the bottle containing the latter was attempted to be concealed by appellant’s wife by throwing it under the house. The officers led appellant to believe that they had evidence against him of sales of whisky, and advised him to come clean and he would get a light sentence. • Thereupon he took the officers out in his pasture, a short distance from his home, and dug up a couple of stills which were there concealed, and which showed evidence of use and consisted of worms, cans, mash barrels, etc., with which liquor could be manufactured. The entire apparatus was buried in the ground and covered with earth, brush, and leaves. Appellant was then placed in jail. A day or two later he was taken to the county attorney’s office, where he was duly warned and made a written confession; same being in conformity with the requirements of article 810, O. 0. P., which was also introduced in evidence.

.The raid upon appellant’s premises was made on March 23, 1923, and the confession was taken tile next day and sets out in detail appellant’s manufacture of liquor in January, 1922, and at intervals thereafter during that year, and also sets out another transaction occurring in January, 1923.

Referring to a number of complaints, both in tho nature of objections to evidence and special charges asked and refused, we observe that it is too well settled to call for discussion that, if one charged with crime makes statements relative thereto found to be true and which conduce to establish his guilt, said statements will be received in testimony regardless of whether he be under arrest, unwarned, or be induced to make such statements by promises or threats, etc. The law seeks truth, and primarily rejects unwarned or involuntary or induced statements-of those in custody, because of the danger to truth resulting from such situation ; but when such statements lead to the discovery of facts establishing guilt, or when such statements then unknown to be true are verified by subsequent discovery of guilty facts showing them to be true, they become admissible. Under subdivision 12, art. 810, Vernon’s Annotated O. O. P., and in section 63 of, Mr. Branch’s Annotated P. C., are collated numerous authorities sustaining this proposition. This is said as disposing of the various contentions relative to statements made by appellant to the officers after they came to his house, the fact that from him they obtained information which led to the discovery of the stills found on his premises, the confession made to the county attorney, and the special charges relating to these various phases of the testimony.

Appellant’s bill of exceptions No. 6 presents his objection to the action of the court in refusing, to strike out that part of the confession in which he said that he was making the liquor to sell and sold it in a certain town. We perceive no error in the court’s action in this regard. We think, the testimony amply sufficient to support the conclusion of guilt, and that the. contention that the conviction rested on the naked confession of appellant is without merit.

Appellant filed a plea in bar asserting that he was not liable to prosecution because he was testifying in said confession against others; also that he had been tried and acquitted upon a charge for manufacturing intoxicating liquor in January, 1923, under which charge and the testimony introduced he might have been convicted of the act, transaction, and offense embraced in the instant prosecution. The matter of his former acquittal was submitted to the jury in the charge and by them decided adversely to appellant. He was charged, in the case resulting in an acquittal, with manufacturing intoxicating liquor on January 4, 1923, ,and the charge of the court submitting the case to the jury therein shows that the jury’s consideration was restricted to an offense committed on or about said date. There was nothing in the charge telling the jury that they could convict if they found the offense to have been committed within the period of limitation. In the instant case the date alleged in the indictment was January 10,1922, and the charge submitted the issue of an offense committed on that date. The state’s proof showed appellant to have committed the offense a number of times during the year 1922. Under all of our authorities, where one pleads former acquittal, the burden is upon him to establish the identity of the offense for which he was tried and acquitted with that involved in the instant transaction. The charge of the court submitting the issue to the jury seems not to have been objectionable to appellant except as reflected by the. requested charge No 7. The jury’s verdict finds ample support in the fact that the testimony shows appellant to have committed the offense more than once within the period of limitation.

There are several special charges relating to the confession based on the propositions of law already considered. Special charge No. 7, relative to the plea in bar, was fully covered by the main charge given on this subject.

The court correctly refused to submit the law of suspended sentence; the facts plainly showing the accused to have been over 25 years of age. There appears no testimony in the record supporting the first part of appellant’s plea in bar, and it was correctly omitted from the charge of the couz-t.

Finding no error in the record, an affirmance will be ordered.

On Motion for Rehearing.

We do not think the cases of Alberson v. State, 54 Tex. Cr. R. 8, 111 S. W. 412, and Goss v. State, 57 Tex. Cr. R. 557, 124 S. W. 107, announce rulings of this court analogous to, or similar to, those involved in our former opinion. The record in this case shows that appellant accompanied his confession to the officers that he had made whisky by discovering to them the apparatus with which he had made same during the years 1922 and 1923. In his written confession detailing the making of whisky dui-ing the former year he refers to his still and mash barrels, and these when found by the officers displayed evidence of use. We think this puts the case on an entirely different footing from one in which the naked confession, standing alone, is held not to show the corpus delicti, and also disposes of the objection that the evidence of the finding of the still, etc., is too remote from the act of manufacture charged in the instant indictment to be admissible herein. This conclusion of ours seems to dispose of the ■ other contentions made in the motion, which seem not to call for any discussion.

The motion for rehearing is overruled. 
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