Case Name: BARKLAY v. STATE
Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
Jurisdiction: Texas
Decision Date: 1919-04-16
Citations: 213 S.W. 642
Docket Number: No. 5069
Parties: BARKLAY v. STATE.
Judges: 
Reporter: South Western Reporter
Volume: 213
Pages: 642–645

Head Matter:
(85 Tex. Cr. R. 512)
BARKLAY v. STATE.
(No. 5069.)
(Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.
April 16, 1919.
On Motion for Rehearing, June 25, 1919.)
1. Homicide <§=303 — Defense of Property— Instruction.
In a prosecution for homicide, evidence held not to require a charge that defendant had a right to act, to prevent or interrupt an intrusion by deceased upon defendant’s lawful possession of property.
2. Homicide <§=124 — Defense oe Property.
Every one has the right to protect his property from unlawful violence.
3. Homicide <§=303 — Defense of Property-Charge — Evidence.
In a trial for homicide, evidence held not to call for a charge that defendant would be justified in committing homicide in defense of his property, if in defense therepf deceased made an unlawful attack upon defendant, from his standpoint, or was injuring or destroying, defendant’s property.
4. Homicide <§=124 — Defense of Property.
Even if deceased was trespassing when drilling in wheat on stubble land which defendant claimed he had not turned back to his landlord, that would not give defendant a right to-kill deceased, and much less would he have such right, where deceased, as defendant came toward him with a gun, turned his team on other land, and was drilling 25 steps from edge-of defendant’s stubble'.
On Motion for Rehearing.
5. Homicide <§=124 — Defense of Property.
If deceased was drilling in wheat on land in defendant’s rental possession, and that was such injury to property as to give a right to kill to prevent it, defendant, under the statute, must have used every effort in his power to repel the aggression before killing and have killed deceased while he was in very act of making the unlawful and violent attack, and, where deceased before killing had gone to other land, there was no right to kill in defense of property.
6. Criminal Law <§=1056(1) — Appeal — Exceptions to Charge.
In a prosecution for homicide, where no exception was taken by defendant to a charge-on his right to seek deceased in a peaceable manner to require an explanation of his drilling on land claimed to be in defendant’s possession and to arm himself, no error was presented.
7. Homicide <§=300(3) — Charge — Self-Defense.
■ In prosecution for homicide wherein defendant set up a defense of property in his rental possession, a charge that if he went to ask deceased why he was working thereon and to desist, and carried a gun, and that, if deceased rushed toward defendant and from deceased’s acts, character, etc., defendant had a reasonable apprehension of serious bodily injury or fear of death, and acted thereon and shot deceased, held to fairly and fully cover self-defense as made by the evidence.
Appeal from District Court, Jones County;. John B. Thomas, Judge;
6. L. Barklay was convicted of manslaughter, and he appeals.
Affirmed.
Jas. P. Stinson and E. T. Brooks, both of Abilene, for appellant.
E. B. Hendricks, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

Opinion:
LATTIMORE, J.
Appellant was convicted of manslaughter in the district court of Jones county, and his punishment fixed at two years' confinement in the penitentiary.
An inspection of the record discloses that appellant was a tenant, and in 1917 cultivated 20 acres of land belonging to a Mrs. Hampton, the renting, of which ,was attended to by Oscar Hampton, her son* The deceased was another son of said Mrs. Hampton. The killing was on October 22, 1917. Part of the land cultivated by appellant was put in maize, and part in cotton, and the crop of maize had been cut some time before the killing, except a small portion which will be mentioned later.
On the afternoon of the killing, the deceased was drilling in wheat on the stubble land from which the maize had been cut by appellant, and appellant, seeing him so doing, took his gun and went out where deceased was at work. Some little time before' appellant got to him, deceased turned his team and began plowing and drilling in wheat on stubble land which had been cultivated by Oscar Hampton. The two men met, or deceased was overtaken by appellant, near the end of the field, and deceased was shot through the heart and killed; it appearing that deceased had gotten down from his drill and was going to appellant when shot. The spot where he was killed was three steps from where he alighted from his drill. It was further shown that deceased was unarmed. The doctor who examined his body said the gunshot wound was about the fourth rib and ranged downward and inward at an angle of from 40 to 60 degrees; that in tracing the course jof the wound his finger slipped into the heart •cavity, which was down about opposite the seventh rib. The facts, as stated above, were uncontroverted. It was also uncon-troverted that, where deceased had been drilling, the maize had been cut, and' he was not disturbing any of appellant's crop raised by him during said year. Appellant had moved off the place of Mrs. Hampton in September and was living on the Powers' place at the time of the homicide.
There were several theories contended for by the defense, namely: Self-defense •against an attack made by the deceased; defense of property; negligent homicide; and accidental homicide.
But two matters are argued in appellant's brief consisting of supposed errors in the charge of the court; appellant evidently being satisfied with the court's charge as presenting the other theories of the ease, and there being no bill of exceptions or errors presented here complaining of the introduction of evidence or any other irregularities during the trial. Appellant strongly insists that the trial court erred, as set out in his second bill of exceptions, to wit:
Failure "to charge the jury that the defendant had a right to act to prevent or interrupt an intrusion by the deceased upon the lawful possession of property."
An examination of the record shows that no special instruction, correcting this supposed error, was presented. Conger v. State, 63 Tex. Cr. R. 312, 140 S. W. 1112; Davis v. State, 63 Tex. Cr. R. 484, 141 S. W. 93; Rogers v. State, 71 Tex. Cr. R. 149, 159 S. W. 40; Chant v. State, 73 Tex. Cr. R. 345, 166 S. W. 513. We have examined all of the authorities cited by the appellant in support of this part of his contention, but find nothing in any of them giving support to .the theory that a man who is plowing a stubble field in the daytime may be killed because he is a trespasser or because he was a trespasser a few moments before he was killed. Such a doctrine would be a tremendous perversion of the justly sacred right given to every citizen to protect his property from unlawful violence. What property of appellant he could thus defend by taking human life is not shown. That deceased, when shot, was not on even the stubble land which had been cultivated by appellant that year, is entirely undisputed. When asked some questions, apparently as to what interest he could claim in the stubble upon which deceased had been so drilling, appellant states:
"I had a little stubble. It would not amount to much. I don't know whether it would amount to as much as $2.50 worth."
Appellant's rental contract, under his own interpretation of it, was to rent the land until he could make a crop and gather it. The witness Short testified that appellant asked him to see Mr. Pool, to whom the rent was to be paid, and see if Pool would allow him to cut his part of the maize and leave the rent maize standing, and he testified that appellant said to him this:
"He said, if they would, he would turn that part of the' land back to them, or something like that."
The witness Short says that he made the proposition to Mr. Pool for appellant, and that it was accepted, and he so notified appellant, and he again stated that he would turn that part of the land back to them. It was also in evidence that a certain, part of the maize was left standing. Mr. Pool, the party to whom the rent was to be paid, said Short came to him with the proposition and he accepted the same. The witness Goodwin said he had a conversation with appellant a short time before the killing, and appellant told him that he was done gathering his crop, and, as stated above, he had moved off the place, and the only remaining part of his crop which was not gathered was 22 pounds of cotton which was shown to have been gathered after the homicide in question. We have given this record careful examination to see if there was any evidence calling for an instruction on homicide in defense of property, and have found none.
What we have just said applies in large measure to the remaining ground of appellant's contention before this court, namely, that the trial court erred:
"Because the court failed to charge the jury in paragraph 8 of his main charge that the defendant would be justified in committing homicide not only in defense of his person, but in defense of his' property, if in defense of his property, the deceased made an unlawful attack upon defendant, viewed from his standpoint, or was injuring or destroying defendant's property, and that the defendant, then acting in his defense or in the defense of his property, shot and killed the deceased."
We repeat substantially what we have said, that, even if deceased, was trespassing when drilling in wheat on stubble land which appellant claims he had not turned back to his landlord, this would give appellant no right to kill him; but in this case it is shown by the appellant himself, as well as by the other eyewitness, the little son of the deceased, that as appellant crossed the field with his gun, coming toward the deceased, the deceased turned his team on the land controlled by Oscar Hampton and was drilling and plowing at a point 25 steps from the edge of appellant's stubble, when appellant came up to him and the shooting resulted. The measurements were made by the appellant's own witness Mr. May, who testified to the distance from the edge of Barklay's land to the place where deceased was killed. There is nothing in such state of the case that could support a reasonable claim that the killing was in defense of property. If the intrusion of deceased upon the premises of appellant aroused him to such a pitch of anger as rendered him incapable of cool reflection, and this was the cause of the homicide, appellant has already received the benefit thereof at the hands of the jury, which found him guilty of manslaughter and gave him a punishment of only two years.
No error appearing in the record, the judgment of the lower court is affirmed.
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