Case Name: GRAVES v. UNITED STATES
Court: Supreme Court of the United States
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 1893-11-06
Citations: 150 U.S. 118
Docket Number: No. 838
Parties: GRAVES v. UNITED STATES.
Judges: 
Reporter: United States Reports
Volume: 150
Pages: 118–127

Head Matter:
GRAVES v. UNITED STATES.
ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT, COURT OE THE UNÍTED STATES EOR THE. WESTERN DISTRICT'OE ARKANSAS.
No. 838.
Submitted October 19, 1893.
Decided November 6, 1893.
Where objection is made in a criminal trial to comments upon facts not' in evidence or statements ¡having no connection with the case or exaggerated expressions of the prosecuting officer, it is the duty of the court to interfere and put a stop to them if they are likely to be prejudicial to the accused.
The wife of a person accused of crime is not a competent witness, on his trial, either in his own behalf or on the part of the govermnent, and a comment to the jury npon her absence by the district attorney,' permitted, by the court after objection, is held to be reversible error.
This was a writ of error upon the conviction of the plaintiff in error for the murder of an unknown man in the Indian Territory on the 13th day of February, 1889. -
The evidence on. the part of the prosecution tended to show that several days' before the murder two men stopped together at Yian, and obtained a contract to make rails for one Waters, and lived in a house about one mile from Waters’ residence. They came from Winslow, in the State of Arkansas, in an old vehicle drawn by two horses, and were on their way to Oklahoma, staying at Yian for a few days for the purpose of earning provisions for themselves and horses. One of these men was accompanied by his wife and two small children. After remaining for several days they left the neighborhood, and were next seen camping near the scene of the -murder, on the evening of February 13. Their personalities were remembered although their names were forgotten, except that a boy remembered the name of one of them to have.been John Graves. The morning after they -were seen together in camp one of the men was seen putting the horses to the vehicle, in which were the woman and a child, but the witness-saw but' one man and one child. About the 1st of May following, the remains of a dead man were found near the place where the witness claimed to have seen the people camped. The body was decayed, but was identified mainly by peculiarities of the teeth and clothing. lie was the man who had claimed to own the horses and wagon. The witnesses for the prosecution recognized the defendant Graves as the other man, though to most of them his name had been unknown. Defendant’s wife was admitted to have been in town at the time of the trial, but did not appear in the court-room. She was seen by one of the witnesses of the prosecution outside of the court-room, and was believed by the witness to have been the woman who had been with the party.
The defence was an alibi, and was supported by several witnesses, who swpre that in the months of January, February, and March of that year defendant was in Washington County, Arkansas, a distance of one hundred miles or more from the place where the remains of the dead man were found. Upon conviction of murder, defendant sued out this writ of error, making fifteen assignments of error.
Mr. A. II. Garland, for plaintiff in error.
Mr. Assistant Attorney General Whitney for defendants .in error.

Opinion:
Mr. Justice Brown,
after stating the case, delivered the opinion of the court.
The first assignment of error is to the action of the court in permitting "the district attorney in his closing argument to the jury, over the objections of the defendant, to comment upon the absence of the defendant's wife from the presence of the court, and to state; .among other things to the jury, that the defendant's wife ought to have been sitting by the side of her husband during the trial, so that, witnesses for the government could see her and identify her as the.woman who was said to have been with the defendant in the Indian country before,the unknown man's remains or bones were found, and other like arguments, statements, and declarations." While we do not wish to be understood as holding that comments by the district attorney upon the facts not in evidence, or statements made having no connection -with the case, or exaggerated expressions, such as counsel in the heat of trial are prone to indulge in, will necessarily vitiate a verdict, if not objected to, yet when the attention of the court is called to them specially, and objection is made, it is its duty to interfere and put a stop to them if they are likely to be prejudicial to the accused. Wilson v. United States, 149 U. S. 60; Hall v. United States, ante, 16.
Had the wife been a competent witness, the comments upon her absence would have been less objectionable. It was said by Chief Justice Shaw in the casé of the Commonwealth v. Webster, 5 Cush. 295, 316 : " But when pretty stringent proof of circumstances is produced tending to support the charge, and it is apparent that the accused is so situated that he can offer evidence of all the facts and circumstances as they existed, and show, if such was the truth, that the suspicious circum stances can be accounted for consistently with his innocence, and he fails to offer such proof, the natural conclusion is that the proof, if produced, instead of rebutting, would tend to support the charge." The rule even in criminal cases is that if a party has it peculiarly within his power to produce witnesses whose testimony would elucidate the transaction, the fact that he does not do it creates the presumption that the testimony, if produced, would be unfavorable. 1 Starkie on Evidence, 5-1; People v. Hovey, 92 N. Y. 551, 559 ; Mercer v. State, 17 Tex. App. 452, 467 ; Gordon v. People, 33 N. Y. 501, 508.
But this presumption does not apply to every fact in the case which it may be in the power of the defendant to prove. He is not bound to anticipate every fact which the government may wish to shew in the course of the trial, and produco evidence of that fact. In this case the wife was not a competent witness either in behalf of, or against her husband; if he had brought her into court, neither he nor the government could have put her upon the stand, and he was under no obligation to produce her for the purpose assigned by the district attorney, that the witnesses for the government could see her and identify her as the woman who was said to have been with the defendant in the Indian country before the unknown man's remains or bones were found. Permission to make this comment was equivalent to saying to the jury that it was a circumstance against the accused that he had failed to produce his wife for identification, when, knowing that she could not be a witness, he was under no obligation to do so. The jury would be likely to draw the inference that she was prevented from testifying- for her husband because her evidence might be damaging. It was in fact as if the'court had charged the jury that it was a circumstance against him that he had failed to produce his wife in court.
The view we have taken of this assignment of error renders it unnecessary to consider the others.
The judgment must be
Reversed, and the case remanded toith instructions to set aside the verdict and grant a new tried.