Pickens v. State

Decided October 15, 1883

Mississippi Supreme Court · decided 1883-10-15

Hon. S. PI. Terral, Judge. This is au appeal from a conviction of murder, and a capital sentence. State’s evidence at the trial showed that the appellant, who had threatened to kill a man named Tutt, was seen with an open knife asking for him, and approaching a place where hours afterward the man’s dead body was found. A medical witness who examined the body stated that death was caused by a cut which severed the aorta near the heart.

Relies on Riggs v. State · Cannon v. State

Decided 1883-10-15

Chalmers, J.,

¶1delivered the opinion of the court.

¶2The fourth instruction given for the State was erroneous, and was so declared in the case of Cannon v. State, 57 Miss. 147. Such, an instruction is proper, where, as in the case of Riggs v. State, 30 Miss. 635, there is proof of an altercation and blows .with the hand between the parties, and the question is whether the act of killing sprang from the heat of passion thereby engendered, or from the previous grudge. But where, as in this casé and in the case of Cannon v. State, ubi supra, the defense rests upon self-defense, and the act of the accused is either' of that character or is murder, such an instruction is well calculated to mislead the jury and is erroneous.

¶3Reversed.