Case Title: Bowens v. State

Citation: 109 N.E.2d 91, 231 Ind. 559

Docket Number: 28,930

State: indiana

Court: Indiana Supreme Court

Date: 1952-12-12T00:00:00Z

Document:
231 Ind. 559 (1952)
109 N.E.2d 91
BOWENS
v.
STATE OF INDIANA
No. 28,930.

Supreme Court of Indiana.
Filed December 12, 1952.
Rehearing denied January 19, 1953.
Thomas M. Crowdus, of Indianapolis, for appellant.
J. Emmett McManamon, Attorney General, John Ready O'Connor, William T. McClain and Thomas J. Faulconer, III, Deputy Attorneys General, for appellee.
JASPER, J.
Appellant was charged by indictment with murder in the first degree, under § 10-3401, Burns' 1942 Replacement. He was found guilty of manslaughter by a jury, and was sentenced to serve not less than two nor more than twenty-one years in the Indiana State Prison. From a judgment on the verdict, he presents this appeal.
*560 The sole assignment of error is the overruling of appellant's motion for new trial. Under this assignment, appellant asserts that the verdict was not sustained by sufficient evidence and was contrary to law.
Appellant contends that the evidence shows without conflict that his killing of the deceased was done in self-defense.
The evidence most favorable to appellee reveals that appellant, on December 2, 1950, met his wife and Raymond Bowens in a shoe repair shop; that the three went to the home of appellant where they drank some whiskey; that during the evening both appellant and the deceased, Raymond Bowens, cried; that appellant slapped his wife while arguing over money, and Raymond Bowens protested. The deceased was then going to take appellant's wife "out of there"; that she got her coat "and was going to carry Raymond out of there." Appellant then ran upstairs for his gun, and when his wife next saw him he was on the third step from the top with the gun in his hand. She then ran outside. The deceased was standing by the kitchen door with his hat and coat on. Appellant's wife pleaded with the deceased to come out. In answer to the question: "Did you see him then go out?" she answered: "I said I saw him make two or three attempts, but I don't know whether he was trying to come out or not. I kept on pleading with him to come out, and he wouldn't come out." She said that she then heard a gunshot and ran to call the police. She saw her husband leave the house. He climbed over the woodshed.
Raymond Bowens, the deceased, was found lying on the kitchen floor, with his head in the doorway, about ten feet from the stairway, with an open knife a few inches south of his right hand, and with a gunshot wound in his head, from which he died on December 3, *561 1950. An empty shotgun shell was found near the stairway. Appellant admitted that he was standing on the stairway and shot the deceased. Appellant was unharmed, and the knife found near the deceased had nothing on it. In a conversation, the wife of appellant stated to her husband: "Willie, you didn't have to do that. You didn't have to kill Raymond Bowen."
Self-defense is an ultimate fact solely for the determination of the jury. Landreth v. State (1930), 201 Ind. 691, 171 N.E. 192; 26 Am. Jur., Homicide, § 512, p. 511.
This court said, in Myers v. State (1922), 192 Ind. 592, 594, 137 N.E. 547, 548:
In Oldham v. State (1946), 224 Ind. 150, 155, 65 N.E.2d 414, 415, 416, this court said:
The trial court must have sufficiently instructed the jury on the law of self-defense, since no question is raised as to any instruction. It was for the jury to determine whether or not appellant acted in self-defense. The jury personally saw the witnesses and heard them testify. The jury weighed the evidence, and, on the motion for new trial, the trial court again weighed the evidence. Oldham v. State (1946), 224 Ind. 150, 65 N.E.2d 414, supra. This court cannot weigh the evidence. Stice v. State (1950), 228 Ind. 144, 89 N.E.2d 915; Myers v. State (1922), 192 Ind. 592, 137 N.E. 547, supra. The verdict of the *563 jury will not be disturbed if sustained by any evidence of probative value or any inferences which may be properly drawn therefrom. Harrison v. State (1952), 231 Ind. 147, 106 N.E.2d 912.
After reviewing all the evidence, we cannot say that the evidence on the issue of self-defense leads to but one reasonable conclusion and is without conflict. It is only when the evidence is without conflict and leads to but one reasonable conclusion, and the verdict of the jury reached a contrary conclusion, that the verdict will be disturbed as being contrary to law. Souerdike v. State (1952), 231 Ind. 204, 108 N.E.2d 136. We are unable to say that the verdict was the result of passion, prejudice, or other improper influence.
From the above facts, there was evidence, with the reasonable inferences to be drawn therefrom, of substantial and probative value, on each material element to prove the crime of manslaughter.
The verdict was not contrary to law.
Finding no reversible error, the judgment is affirmed.
NOTE.  Reported in 109 N.E.2d 91.