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15 Ala. App. 662

74 So 755

Smith v. State

Alabama Court of Appeals

Decided April 3, 1917

Alabama Court of Appeals · decided 1917-04-03

Heard before Hon. W. W. Haralson. Milton Smith was convicted of manslaughter, and he appeals. The defendant and Delbert Sisk were shooting craps in an outhouse used as a cotton bin, and a dispute arose as to whether defendant had won his point, and an altercation ensued in which Smith shot and killed Sisk with a pistol.

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“the harmful results arising from giving an erroneous charge are not cured by a correct statement of the law.”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 17 Ala. App. 469 - Montgomery v. State

Relies on Brewer v. State · Langham v. State · Reese v. State

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Reversed and remanded · Decided 1917-04-03

How this case has been cited

Cited by 9 later decisions — most recently October 1974

9 state decisions

401917192019301940195019601970decided

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, P. J.

¶1 (1) Any act intentionally done or word intentionally spoken which under the circumstances had a tendency to provoke a difficulty would be wrongful within the meaning of the law, although ordinarily such word or act would not be wrongful. To save the right of self-defense, the defendant at the *664 time of and leading up to the homicide “must not be unmindful of his acts or conduct which are likely to produce a deadly combat, and if by his act or conduct he shows a willingness to enter the conflict, or if by those acts he invites it, he must be held to have produced the necessity for slaying his adversary, and cannot invoke the doctrine of self-defense.” — Reese v. State, 135 Ala. 14, 33 South. 672; Langham v. State, 12 Ala. App. 46, 68 South. 504. He must be wholly free from fault.- — Brewer v. State, 160 Ala. 66, 49 South. 336.

¶2 (2, 3) Before the conduct of the accused can be said to be wrongful in the sense that it operates to cut off the right of self-defense, his acts must be done with a knowledge of the circumstances surrounding him at the time, and that his conduct is likely to provoke a difficulty. If he is ignorant of the presence of his adversary and that his acts are likely to produce combat, and his conduct is in itself innocent, it would not be wrongful. The question as to whether the conduct of the accused is wrongful and whether it brought on, provoked, or encouraged the difficulty is one of fact for the jury.

¶3 (4) Charge 1 given at the instance of the solicitor is erroneous in assuming that the conduct of the defendant was wrongful and was invasive of the province of the jury.

¶4 (5) The harmful results arising from giving an erroneous charge are not cured by a correct statement of the law in the oral charge. — Acts 1915, p. 815.

¶5 (6, 7) If the defendant was at fault in bringing on the difficulty in the first instance, before he could set up self-defense he must have withdrawn from the conflict in good faith and announced his desire for peace by word or act. — Parker v. State, 88 Ala. 4, 7 South. 98; Brewer v. State, supra. Charge 5 was refused without error.

¶6 We have examined the other exceptions, and find nothing to warrant further discussion.

¶7 For the error pointed out, the judgment is reversed and the cause remanded.

¶8 Reversed and remanded.

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