Court Opinion

ID: 9683743
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:36:11.170974+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:50.064196
License: Public Domain

ON APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR REHEARING.
MORRISON, Judge.
Appellant again calls our attention to the trial court’s failure to submit his affirmative defense supplied by the witness, Jim Evans. Viewed in the light most favorable to this appellant, the testimony of this witness established that just prior to passing the Ortmann car, appellant pushed his brake pedal to the floor, his brakes did not work and he pulled over to his left-hand side of the highway to avoid hitting the Ortmann car and hit the oncoming Zunker car, killing the occupants thereof. This being a misdemeanor case, it was incumbent upon appellant, in addition to excepting to the court’s charge, to submit to the court a correct charge upon the subject. We find no requested charge regarding the failure of brakes as accounting for appellant’s driving on his left side of the highway.
Requested charge No. 1 would have required a verdict of not guilty if appellant “swerved his car from his right side of said highway in order to avoid a collision with the Ortmann car.” This obviously in itself would be no defense.
Requested charge No. 2 would have authorized acquittal upon finding that the collision was the result of acts done or omitted under a sudden emergency. Such charge was not called for by the evidence as we view it if, in fact, such doctrine has any application in the trial of a criminal case.
*104The third requested charge defined unavoidable accident as “a sudden and unexpected happening occurring without fault or negligence on the part of any party connected therewith” and instructed a verdict of not guilty if the jury believed or had a reasonable doubt that this collision was the result of an unavoidable accident.
We do not believe that such a charge was called for by the evidence. Nor do we think such charge is applicable in negligent homicide cases, the question of negligence on the part of the deceased or any party other than the accused being immaterial.
Art. 1233, P. C., provides that the want of proper care and caution distinguishes the offense of negligent homicide from excusable homicide.
Art. 1228, P. C., provides that homicide is excusable when the death of a human being happens by accident or misfortune, though caused by the act of another.
In Hoffman v. State, 85 Tex. Cr. R. 11, 209 S.W. 747, both the companion of the deceased and the accused were claiming that each was free from blame and attributing the accident to the negligence of the other. Appellant sought to have the jury instructed as to the law which would have excused him from liability if the injury was the result of accident or misfortune, and it was held that he was entitled to such a charge. The court said: “If the jury believed the evidence of the appellant and his witnesses * * * they would have been justified in concluding that the injury was not due to negligence on the part of the appellant, but was the result of accident or misfortune.”
The only charge on the subject which we have found to have the approval of this court appears in the files of this court in Hoffman v. State, supra. This charge began with the terms of Art. 1228 as follows:
“You are charged as a part of the law of this case that homicide is excusable when the death of a human being happens by accident or misfortune, though caused by the act of another who is in the prosecution of a lawful object by lawful means.” This was followed by the application of the facts of the affirmative defense so that the jury might know ivith certainty what conduct they were finding to have occurred in order to acquit the defendant.
*105The requested charge in the instant case merely called for a finding that the collision was the result of an unavoidable accident. Such was defined as will be seen in the third requested charge heretofore discussed.
In this connection it will be noted that in Menefee v. State, 129 Tex. Cr. R. 375, 87 S.W. 2d 478, this court defined “unavoidable accident” as the term is used in negligent homicide cases as:
“An unavoidable accident is one that could not reasonably be anticipated. If it occurs without fault or failure of duty on the part of the person to whom the occurrence is attributable, there is no wrong.”
We are constrained to believe that the requested charge was not correct, insofar as negligent homicide is concerned, and that therefore there was no error in its refusal.
Appellant, for the first time, calls this court’s attention to what he claims are certificates of error by the trial court contained in the bills of exception. The rule has been well settled that where the entire matter is before us, we will not be bound by the trial court’s certification of error. McGee v. State, 155 Tex. Cr. Rep. 639, McCune v. State, No. 25,020, (page 207 of this volume); Moore v. State, 151 Tex. Crim. Rep. 217, 206 S.W. 2d 600; Douglas v. State, 144 Tex. Cr. R. 29,161 S.W. 2d 92; Tex. Dig., Crim Law key 1111(4) & (5).
Finding no reversible error, the appellant’s motion for rehearing is overruled.