Case ID: tex-ct-app_26/html/0192-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "White, Presiding Judge.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

No. 2949.
    R. S. Parsons v. The State.
    Opinion delivered October 20, 1888.
    Obstructing Public Road—Term Defined—Pact Case.—To constitute the offense of obstructing a public road, it must appear from the evidence that the obstruction was “wilfully” erected. “Wilful,” in legal parlance, means “with legal malice;” “an evil intent,” or the performing of an act without reasonable ground to believe it to be lawful. In this case the State proved the location of the road, and the fact that the accused obstructed it by building a fence across it; and further that, when notified to remove it as an'obstruetion, the accused stated that he would remove it at once upon being convinced that his fence was not on his own land and crossed a public road. The defense proved that before he built the fence the accused had the land surveyed, and, according to the survey, built the said fence on his own land. Held, insufficient to support a conviction for wilfully obstruct" ing a public road.
    Appeal from the County Court of Titus. Tried below before the Hon. J. R. Riddle, County Judge.
    This conviction was for wilfully obstructing a public road, and the penalty assessed was a fine of one dollar and costs.
    The syllabus and the opinion sufficiently state the substance of the evidence.
    
      G. F. Conley and S. P. Pounders, for the appellant.
    
      W. L. Davidson, Assistant Attorney General, for the State.
   White, Presiding Judge.

Before appellant built his fence, which, it is alleged, obstructed the public road, he had the lines of his lands surveyed, and, according to said survey, built his fence upon his own land. ' If he believed that the land was his when he built the fence, then he can not be guilty of the offense of which he has been convicted, because the statutory crime is made to consist mainly in the fact that the act was “wilfully” committed, and the word “wilful” means legal malice, an evil intent, or without reasonable ground to believe the act to be lawful. (Willson’s Crim. Stats., sec. 685.)

The evidence as presented in the record fails to sustain the judgment, and it is reversed and the cause remanded.

Reversed and remanded.