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14 Ala. App. 133

Cauley v. State

Alabama Court of Appeals

Decided June 6, 1916

Alabama Court of Appeals · decided 1916-06-06

Heard before Hon. H. A. Pearce. Demus Cauley was convicted of the larceny of a cow, and he appeals. Witness Lee testified that he lost a light red cow with horns, unmarked, from his barn in Houston county, on a certain Tuesday night, and, on the Saturday following, found a hide at Clendenning’s hoúse which came off of his cow.

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“The statute makes the stealing of a cow, regardless of the value of the cow, grand larceny . . ., and in such case it is not necessary to allege or prove value. . . . Therefore the allegation 'of the value of thirty-five dollars,' not being descriptive of the offense, was properly regarded as surplusage, and proof thereof was not necessary.”

quoted by 2 later decisions, including 555 So. 2d 246 - Lunceford v. City of Northport, 551 So. 2d 1161 - Smith v. State

Relies on Hargrove v. State · Gilmore v. State · Whatley v. State

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Affirmed · Decided 1916-06-06

How this case has been cited

Cited by 20 later decisions — most recently August 2001

20 state decisions

801916192019301940195019601970198019902000decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

BROWN, J.

¶1(1, 2) It is here urged that the court erroneously admitted the inculpatory statement imputed to the defendant by the witness Lee in response to the solicitor’s question, “After you lost the cow, did he say anything about getting the cow?”

¶2“Inculpatory confessions, voluntarily made, are admissible as evidence tending to show guilt; and while such confessions are prima facie involuntary, and therefore inadmissible, it is the duty of the trial court, in all cases, before permitting such confessions to be shown, to ascertain that they are voluntary; and on appeal, unless the record affirmatively shows that this duty was not performed by the court, the presumption will be indulged that a proper predicate was laid for the admission of the evi*135dence.”—Fortner v. State, 12 Ala. App. 180, 67 South. 720; Whatley v. State, 144 Ala. 75, 39 South. 1014; Price v. State, 117 Ala. 113, 23 South. 691; Gilmore v. State, 126 Ala. 20, 28 South. 595.

¶3The record does not affirmatively show error in the admission of this testimony.

¶4(3) The evidence shows that about the time Lee’s cow disappeared the defendant butchered a cow which he claimed to have purchased from Dr. Hammond; that this cow was in condition for beef and weighed 80 to 90 pounds to the quarter. The defendant also offered evidence that Lee offered to sell his cow to the defendant for beef, and that defendant refused to purchase because the cow was not in condition for beef. The state’s theory is that the cow butchered by the defendant was Lee’s cow, and evidence tending to show that she was in condition for beef was in rebuttal of the defendant’s evidence, and was properly admitted.Lang v. State, 1 Ala. App. 128, 55 South. 1024.

¶5(4) The question of the defendant’s guilt or innocence, under the evidence, was for the jury, and the court properly refused the affirmative charge.Finney v. State, 10 Ala. App. 39, 65 South. 93; Turner v. State, 97 Ala. 57, 12 South. 54; Hargrove v. State, 147 Ala. 97, 41 South. 972, 119 Am. St. Rep. 60, 10 Ann. Cas. 1126.

¶6(5) The statute makes the stealing of a cow, regardless of the value of the cow, grand larceny (Code 1907, § 7324), and in such case it is not necessary to allege or prove value (Parker v. State, 111 Ala. 72, 20 South. 641). Therefore the allegation “of the value of thirty-five dollars,” not being descriptive of the offense, was properly regarded as surplusage, and proof thereof was not necessary.—Newsom v. State, 107 Ala. 137, 18 South. 206; McGehee v. State, 52 Ala. 229; State v. Steelman, 7 Port. 495.

¶7We find no error in the record, and the judgment is affirmed.

¶8Affirmed.

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