Court Opinion

ID: 9825213
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 12:19:33.343794+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:40:33.101243
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing.
Out of deference to distinguished counsel in his insistences in able brief on application for rehearing, we will extend our original opinion.
It was so clearly evident to us that a sufficient predicate was based for the introduction of the alleged dying declarations that we did not deem it necessary to set out the evidence relative thereto.
As indicated in the original opinion the predicate evidence related to two different statements of the declarant.
Proof of the first claimed declaration was made by an uncle of the deceased, and the time was fixed at about two days before death. The uncle testified that the deceased told him on several prior occasions that he (deceased) was going to die. In reference *492to the time in question the testimony in pertinent part is:
“Q. He said he was going to die anyhow? A. Yes, sir.
“Q. Well, he told you he was going to die? A. Yes, sir.
“Q. Didn’t he tell you in that conversation at any time that he didn’t think he was going to get well? A. He told me several times before that day he didn’t think he would ever get well.
“Q. And this time he told you he was going to die? A. Yes, sir.”
Proof of the second statement was given in the evidence of a brother-in-law of the deceased. The time fixed was the night before death the next day. On this inquiry the record shows:
“Q. The night before he died, just about a day before he died, I reckon, it was the night before — did you have a conversation with him about how this shooting occurred ? A. Yes, sir.
“Q. State what he did tell you about not knowing he was going to get well. A. He said he knew he was going to die and wanted to tell about how it happened.”
It is insisted that it is not clearly shown that the declarant, at the time it is claimed he made the declarations, was mentally capable of knowing the purport and significance of his utterances. This urgency is based primarily on the testimony of the attending physician and the evidence of the hospital charts. It is here disclosed that the patient was at times rational and at other times irrational and that “his mental condition would come and go.” This fact was attributable to the seriousness of the injury which at times would cause high fever.
On application for rehearing, in supplemental brief, counsel cites and quotes at length from the opinion in Jollay v. State 130 Tenn. 286, 170 S.W. 58, 62. As quoted, the court said in the Jollay case: “The burden is upon the party offering the declaration to establish a proper predicate for its introduction. He must, as a condition precedent to its admission to the jury, show affirmatively that the declarant was in articulo mortis, and that he was fully conscious of his impending death, not as a matter of surmise and conjecture, but as a fixed and inevitable fact. The court must also be satisfied that the declarant had sufficient mental capacity to comprehend the nature of his statements.”
Counsel failed in his quotation, just above, to complete the sentence; the omitted part we consider very pertinent and strikingly applicable to the facts in the case at bar. It is: “ * * * but on this point, if nothing appears, either by way of direct evidence or of circumstance, to suggest a doubt of his mental capacity, the general presumption which obtains in favor of sanity will suffice, and it will be presumed that he possessed sufficient intelligent consciousness to correctly remember and accurately narrate the facts.”
The record in the instant case discloses that at the stage in the progress of the trial when the alleged dying declarations were admitted in evidence the court below did not have before it the testimony of the physician or the evidence of the hospital chart to which reference is made above. It was not made to appear at the time of the introduction of the statements that during the illness of the deceased he was at times rational and at other times irrational. There was no evidence at this point to suggest a doubt of the mental capacity of the declarant. On the contrary, the declarations, as related by the witnesses, appear to be in rational form and there is no indication of incoherence or lack of mental alertness.
We hold that it was for the trial judge to determine whether or not the deceased had sufficient mentality at the time. He was not in error in admitting the statements. The weight and credit to be given the evidence was for the jury to consider. Carmichael v. State, 197 Ala. 185, 72 So. 405; Shell v. State, 88 Ala. 14, 7 So. 40; Sims v. State, 139 Ala. 74, 36 So. 138, 101 Ann.St.Rep. 17.
We did not overlook the rule announced in Shell v. State, supra, to the effect that a dying declaration is subject to impeachment. In our view of the nurse’s testimony which is set out in the original opinion, the alleged statement of the deceased narrated by her is so indefinite, uncertain, and unrelated that it cannot be ac*493cepted in evidence as an impeachment of the claimed dying declarations. Even the time of the alleged assertion is left in doubt.
It is without dispute in the evidence that the defendant’s cows were damaging the crops of the deceased. On the occasion of the fatal difficulty, the latter drove the animals out of his corn field, up to the appellant’s barn. The defendant worked at night and was undressed in his bedroom when the deceased went in to see him. The evidence is in sharp conflict relating to what occurred in the room. We still entertain the view that it was for the jury to determine what happened there and from these circumstances adjudge who was at fault in bringing on the fatal difficulty. For this reason, refused charge numbered 8 was not due to be given.
The Reporter will set out refused charge numbered 13. It is insisted that this charge is not substantially covered by the court’s oral charge, as we held in the original opinion. In his oral instruction the judge said in pertinent part: “ * * * the first of these things is that there must be an impending necessity to take the life of another party, to prevent the defendant’s own life from being taken, or to prevent grievous bodily harm being done to his life. A man cannot merely shoot another without having that necessity present. It is possible under certain circumstances that a man have an honest belief that that necessity exists, and if he does have that honest belief that it is necessary to kill another to prevent his own life being taken, or grievous bodily harm being done to himself, or to the members of his family, and if that honest belief is based on a thing which is reasonably apparent to an ordinarily reasonable man, then that is sufficient, whether or not that necessity actually existed or not. But it must be — unless it does actually exist —it must be of such a character that it reasonably appeared to a reasonable man that the necessity did exist, and that the defendant at the time he did the act, honestly believed that it was necessary for him. at that time and on that occasion, to take the life of the other man, to prevent his own life being taken, or the life of some member of his family, or to prevent grievous bodily harm being done.”
Several of the given charges also relate to the same principle of la\v. Unquestionably, the appellant was not denied the right to have the jury instructed fully and fairly on the rule stated in the instant charge.
Distinguished counsel urges with eloquent plea that we should hold the lower court in error for the denial of the motion for a new trial. He says in part: “The rights of American citizens have reached a new low, if defendant is not entitled to another trial. His conviction, if permitted to stand, sweeps away the ancient and prized rights of a man in his home. If not reversed, then no longer is the home a man’s castle, it becomes a mere adornment, a mausoleum.”
Yes, a man’s home is his castle and may it ever be. Around its fireside with his family, may he always be permitted to dwell in peace, happiness, contentment and security, but his right to this protection must be commensurate with the rights of others. The law prescribes the limitations of his protective privileges.
If the State’s evidence is to be accepted, the deceased entered the home of the accused in a peaceful manner to counsel about a matter of grave concern to the property rights of the dead man. In his alleged dying declaration, the deceased declared that he went into the house upon the invitation of the defendant. As we have stated, what occurred in the house is in irreconcilable conflict, but it is found in the evidence without dispute that deceased had left the inside of the house and was out some steps away when he was mortally wounded.
We here call to mind the often repeated assertion that “the verdict of a jury and the judgment of a trial court are solemn things; and they should not be overturned unless a good, legal reason is shown therefor.”
In the study of the instant record we are impressed with the evident care and caution with which the case was tried. We are not convinced that we should disturb the judgment of the nisi prius court in his view *494that the motion for a new trial should be denied.
The application for rehearing is overruled.
Opinion extended.
Application overruled.