Court Opinion

ID: 9679106
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 06:40:45.051023+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:10.160951
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing.
We granted the application for rehearing in the instant case and ordered writ of certiorari to issue to the Court of Appeals, 56 So.2d 363, to determine whether or not the Court of Appeals held in its opinion that the defendant was properly convicted on evidence from which the jury could only reasonably infer that the defendant was guilty as charged.
“The proof of the charge, in criminal causes, involves the proof of two distinct propositions: first, that the act itself was done; and, secondly, that it was done 'by the person charged, and by none other — in other words, proof of the corpus delicti, and of the identity of the prisoner. The ascertainment that an offense has been committed, is as essential to conviction, as that the defendant is the guilty agent.
“Both of these essential propositions are ’for the determination of the jury, and both must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Winslow v. State, 76 Ala. 42; DeSilvey v. State, 245 Ala. 163, 16 So.2d 183.
We have made a careful study of the opinion of the Court of Appeals and are to the conclusion that the Court of Appeals did not intend to hold, and did not' hold, that the defendant could be convicted on evidence from which the jury could only reasonably infer his guilt. We think that court held, in effect, that both the corpus delicti and the defendant’s guilty participation must be proved by evidence which convinced the jury that the defendant was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. So considered, the opinion of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
Affirmed.
FOSTER, SIMPSON and GOODWYN, JJ., concur.