Case Name: Jack Cruce, Plaintiff in Error, v. The State of Florida, Defendant in Error
Court: Florida Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1922-03-23
Citations: 84 Fla. 191
Docket Number: 
Parties: Jack Cruce, Plaintiff in Error, v. The State of Florida, Defendant in Error.
Judges: Ellis and West, J. J., concur.
Reporter: Florida Reports
Volume: 84
Pages: 191–201

Head Matter:
Jack Cruce, Plaintiff in Error, v. The State of Florida, Defendant in Error.
Opinion Filed March 23, 1922.
Where the evidence fully sustains a verdict of murder in the first degree charged to have been" committed “unlawfully and from a premeditated design to effect the death of” the person killed, the mere omission of the word “design” from one of the charges given, is not in view of other charges given and upon a.consideration of the whole record, .harmful or. reversible error.
Opinion Filed August 8, 1922, on Rehearing.
Headnotes by Mr. Justice Ellis, on rehearing.
1. Upon the trial of an indictment for murder in the first degree a charge given by the court to the jury, that if they should find from the evidence beyond a reasonable doubt “that the defendant unlawfully killed the deceased at the time and place and by the means charged in the indictment and that he did so from a premeditated on his part to effect the death of the deceased,” is erroneous for the omission of the word “design.”
2. It is not within the power of the court to set at naught the words of the statute defining the crime of murder and assert that one on trial for such crime is not denied a fair trial according to the forms and procedure of law when the offense with which the defendant is charged in the indictment is incorrectly defined by the court in an instruction to the jury.
3. The statute requires the charge in a capital case to be wholly in writing and it should be given to the jury literally as it is written.
A Writ of Error to the Circuit Court for Taylor County, M. F. Horne, Judge.
Reversed.
W. P. Chavous and B. J. Hamrick, for Plaintiff in Error.
Rivers H. Buford, Attorney General and J. B. Gaines, Assistant, for Defendant in Error.

Opinion:
Whitfield, , J.
The indictment herein sufficiently charges murder in the first degree, alleged to have been committed "-unlawfully and from a premeditated design to effect the death of ' ' the person killed, who was a man, and of course a human being, within the contemplation of the statutory definition of murder. Chap. 8470, Acts of 1921.
At the trial the court gave, among others, the following charges:
"8. If you find from the evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant unlawfully killed the deceased at the time and place and by the means charged in the indictment and that he did so of and from a premeditated on his part to effect the death of the deceased, then you should find him guilty of murder in the first degree, and this with or without recommendation to mercy-as you may determine.
"9. If you find from the evidence in this case beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant unlawfully at the time and place and by the means alleged in the indictment killed the deceased as alleged in the indictment and that such killing was perpetrated by an act imminently dangerous to another and evincing a depraved mind regardless of human life although without any premeditated design to effect the death of any particular individual then you should find the defendant guilty of murder in the second degree. ' '
Though the defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree, the mere omission of the word "design" after the word "premeditated' in the 8th charge is not on the whole record harmful or reversible error.
The word ' ' design " is a part of the statutory definition of murder in the first degree, but the law does not expressly require the trial judge to give the statutory definition in. his charge to the jury. In. the 8th charge the court refers to the legal result of a finding on the evidence as stated and uses the words "premediated on his part to effect the death of the deceased, ' ' which reasonably should have conveyed to the minds of the jury the legal proposition that under the allegations of the indictment, premediation to effect the death of the deceased was essential to a finding of murder in the first degree, particularly when the next charge uses the words "premeditated design to effect the death ' ' in differentiating murder in the second degree from murder in the first degree. The evidence so clearly establishes a homicide from a premeditated design to effect the death of the deceased that the jury could not have been misled by the mere omission of the word ' ' design ' ' from the 8th charge.
The charges relative to self defense have sufficient bases in the evidence and they are not erroneous as matter of law.
As the evidence independently of the dying declaration amply supports the verdict, and no material errors of law or of procedure appear by the transcript, the judgment should be and is' affirmed.
Ellis and West, J. J., concur.