Court Opinion

ID: 9674088
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 04:22:59.490207+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:25.429852
License: Public Domain

J. SeaborN Holt, J., dissenting. I would affirm this ease in its entirety. The appellant, Yanteen Dean Smith, was convicted of the crime of second degree murder, a felony, on evidence that showed she had lulled her husband, Harold Dean, by poisoning. She was sentenced to serve, and did serve, a term in our State Penitentiary. On appeal to this court we affirmed the judgment, Smith v. State, 222 Ark. 650, 262 S. W. 2d 272, and in that opinion said: . . the evidence was sufficient to have supported a conviction for first degree murder.” The majority holds that the introduction of a certified copy of the judgment of appellant’s conviction of a felony, was not sufficient to prove the facts on which the judgment was based. In other words, that there was no competent proof that appellant actually killed her husband. I do not agree. It seems to me that we should here and now adopt the fair and common sense rule, sanctioned by sound reasoning, that the offer in evidence of a certified copy of the judgment of a felony conviction, in the trial of a later civil case is sufficient evidence of the facts on which it was based. This procedure appears now to be in accord with the modern trend of decisions in many of the courts of this nation. As I view it, to require the appellees here to prove over again that appellant killed her husband, in the teeth of a jury verdict and the solemn decision of this court that she did, would be little short of ridiculous. In support of my views McCormick on Evidence, Page 619, has this to say: “. . . a growing minority of courts . . . has insisted that common sense and consistency of adjudication require that a judgment of conviction, offered against the person convicted in a later civil case involving some of the same issues, be admitted as evidence of the facts on which the judgment was based. This view was embodied in the Model Code, and has been sanctioned by the Uniform Rules with the important limitation to convictions for felony. . . . Rule 63(20) makes admissible ‘evidence of a final judgment adjudging a person guilty of a felony, to prove any fact essential to sustain the judgment’. Probably the trend of evolution will be toward the admission generally against a present party of any judgment or finding in a former civil or criminal case if the party had an opportunity to defend. The principles on which is founded the hearsay exception for official written statements would justify this extension.” We said in the Horn v. Cole Case, 203 Ark. 361, 156 S. W. 2d 787, “We think that the principle of sound public policy which demands that a sane, felonious killer should not profit by his crime should be applied as often as and whenever any claim is made by such killer, whether under contract, will, or statute. The decisions which we prefer to follow attain the result which everyone (and even the cases holding the contrary) admits ought to be attained if possible.” I think all will agree that appellant ought not to be allowed to profit by her own felonious act.