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150 Ala. 25

Brown v. State

Supreme Court of Alabama

Decided March 2, 1907

Supreme Court of Alabama · decided 1907-03-02

Heard before Hon. Joseph H. Nathan. Tlie record showed, after setting out the arraignment by reading the indictment to the defendant and his plea of not guilty thereto, as follows: “It'is ordered by the court, on motion of the solicitor, the defendant, George Brown, being present in person and by attorney, that the trial of this case be set for Wednesday, April 25, 1906. The number of jurors to be drawn was fixed by the court at 35.

Relies on Gilmore v. State · Shirley v. State · Gregory v. State

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1907-03-02

How this case has been cited

Cited by 11 later decisions — most recently December 1976

11 state decisions

7019071910192019301940195019601970decided

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.

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ANDEBSON, J.

¶1The record shows a sufficient compliance with the statute as to setting case, drawing jury, etc. — §§ 5004, 5005 of the Code of 1896.

¶2The defendant sustained no injury as to the exclusion of the evidence as to “old holes in the bones of deceased.”

¶3The predicate for the dying declarations was sufficient.Gregory v. State, 140 Ala. 16, 37 South. 259; McQueen v. State, 94 Ala. 50, 10 South. 433.

¶4In the absence of any evidence of flight, the fact that defendant surrendered to the sheriff after the killing was not admissible. He could not by his subsequent act make evidence for himself, and the fact that the state proved this fact for him did not warrant him in *30doing so over the state’s objection. Moreover, this fact had been proved by several, state witnesses, was undisputed, and we cannot see Low the defendant was injured by a denial of further proof on the subject.

¶5Charge 6, requested by the defendant, should have been given. It is the same as a charge approved by this court in cases of Neilson v. State, 40 South. 221, and Gilmore v. State, 99 Ala. 154, 13 South. 536.

¶6Charge 11, requested by the defendant, was properly refused. It has often been condemned by this court.—Pitts v. State, 140 Ala. 70, 37 South. 101.

¶7Charge 18, requested by defendant, is a mere argument, and -was properly refused.

¶8Charge 25, requested by the defendant, was properly refused. It postulates an acquittal upon a mere “doubt,” and not a reasonable doubt.Shirley v. State, 144 Ala. 35, 40 South. 269.

¶9Charges 42 and 43, requested by the defendant, were properly refused. They were mere answers to the solicitor’s argument.—Tribble v. State, 145 Ala. 23, 40 South. 938.

¶10Charges 45 and 46 were properly refused. While dying declarations should be received in evidence with caution, the -weight and sufficiency is a question for the jury, as is the rule as to all evidence nrled admissible by the trial court. Juries should consider and weigh all evidence with caution; but a charge which singles out certain parts of the evidence, and seeks to lay special stress thereupon, and to give undue prominence thereto, is properly refused.

¶11Charge' 47, requested by defendant, the general charge, was properly refused.

¶12Charge 48, requested by defendant, the general charge as to the second count of the indictment, had already been given. It is the same as given charge A.

¶13For the error above pointed out, the judgment, of the circuit court is reversed, and the cause is remanded.

¶14Reversed and remanded.

Haralson, Dowdell, Denson, and McClellan, JJ., concur.
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