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61 Mo. App. 662

State v. Hayden

Missouri Court of Appeals

Decided April 1, 1895

Missouri Court of Appeals · decided 1895-04-01

—Hon. John E. Ryland, Judge. (1) The court erred in refusing instructions offered at the close of the state’s evidence. There is a total failure of proof of defendant’s guilt and the judgment should be reversed. State v. Ballard, 104 Mo. 634; State v. Crow, 54 Mo. App. 208. The defendant ought not to be punished, if he supposed in good faith that he was gathering up his property under a license from the real owner.

Aeeiemed · Decided 1895-04-01

Ellison, J.

¶1—Defendant was charged, tried and convicted of petit larceny and a fine of $15 imposed. We have gone carefully over the evidence and find that there is sufficient to sustain the verdict of the jury, and that, therefore, defendant’s demurrer was properly overruled. We would, of course, interfere and reverse the case, if there was no substantial evidence from which a jury could arrive at the conclusion that the defendant was guilty. But we are not authorized to weigh the evidence and decide the case here as we might believe a jury should decide. That is the exclusive province of the jury.

¶2Instructions were given by the court and objected to, but as there was no exception taken to the action of the court in this respect we can not notice objections now urged. The fact that an exception was taken to the order of the court overruling the motion for a new trial, wherein complaint was made of the instructions, *665will not help the' matter. There must be exceptions taken to the action of the court at the time. This has been so frequently ruled in the appellate courts of the state as not to require the citation of cases.

¶3Objection is made here to the ruling of the court on the admission of testimony. Most of these objections are without merit and some of them are without ■exception to the action of the court at the time the ruling was made. Particularly is this true where the ■court seems to have permitted witness E. Gh Kitchen to relate what the witness Freeman told him.

¶4We find nothing to justify our interference with the judgment and must, therefore, order its affirmance.

All concur.
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