Mankey v. StateMankey v. State
- Reporters:
- , ,
- Before:
- Butler
Appellant was indicted, tried and convicted for stealing a hog. Thе sole ground urged for reversal is that the verdict is not supported by substantial competent testimony. Briefly stated, the evidence is to the effect that on a certain day in March, 1935, •appellant sоld a hog to J. 0; Campbell and delivered it to him in his lot. When Campbell went to the lot the next morning, he discovered the hog was gone and saw а mark on the ground indicating that it had been dragged to’ the road and walked on its fore legs down it. A boy, Carl Simons, testified that the night the hog was stolеn he was standing in front of a little restaurant when appellant cаme by with a hog* and asked witness to help him take it to his home. Appellant told him that the hog-belonged to Campbell, and that witness should say nothing about its being in his possession. Witness went with appellant, driving the hog along the road, until they reached appellant’s home where they put the hog in a small chicken house. On cross-examination, this witness tеstified in a manner from which his animus against the appellant might be inferred. It appeared, however, that this was created in his mind after hе had testified before the grand jury and disclosed to that body the facts to which he testified on the trial of the case.
It is insisted that Simons was аn accomplice of the appellant in the commission of the larceny, and that his testimony was not corroborated. We think the facts establish that relation, to the appellant as to the commission of the crime. In Murphy v. State, 130 Ark. 353, 197 S. W. 585, the following definition of “accomplice” was adopted. “An accomplicе in the full, and generally accepted legal signification of the word is one who in any manner participates in the criminality of аn act, whether he is considered in strict legal propriety as a principal in the first or second degree or merely as an accessory before or after the fact.” Under § 3181 of Crawford & Moses’ Digest, a conviction cannot be had upon the testimony оf an accomplice unless corroborated by other evidence tending- to connect the defendant with the commission оf the offense. The amount of corroborating evidence necessary, however, is a question for the jury. Kennedy v. State, 115 Ark. 480, 171 S. W. 878. If, therefоre, there is any substantial evidence tending to connect the dеfendant with the commission of the crime, although if may be slight, it will be sufficient tо support the jury’s verdict. Townsend v. State, 148 Ark. 573, 231 S. W. 1.
It was in evidence that the chicken house, said by Simons to be the place where the hog was taken and confined, was in a condition that made it insecure, аnd the day following the larceny the hog was discoyered in a rice field, the location of which with respect to appellаnt’s home not being disclosed by the evidence. It was further in evidencе that on the night of the larceny two men were seen driving a hog alоng the road in the direction of appellant’s home.. The witness wаs unable to distinguish more than the general outlines of the two men, but stated they approximated the height of appellant and Simons. This corroborating evidence, while not altogether satisfactory and convincing, is sufficient under our decisions to warrant the submission of thе case to the jury as to the sufficiency of the evidence to corroborate the testimony of Simons, the accomplice. The case must, therefore, be affirmed.
It is so ordered.