State v. BuchananState v. Buchanan
The opinion of the Court was delivered by
Thе defendant appeals from an eighteen months’ sentence of imprisonment in the penitentiary on an informatiоn for larceny.
The.grounds of the appeal are
J. That the information charged that the larceny was committed by one E. Buchanan, and the Court during the prоgress of the trial, on motion of the District Attorney, permitted the information to be amended by setting out the name of the dеfendant as “Amos Buchanan.”
It appeared that the accused was known and called in all the proceеdings, Amos Buchanan, was thus arraigned and pleaded, and the evidence showed it was his true name.
The amendment allowеd was authorized by the express terms of Sec. 1047, R. S.
Under the common law, as it existed before the statutory change refеrred to was made, an accused could not take advantage of a misnomer after arraignment and pleа.
Therefore, in this case, had the correction not been made and a conviction been bad, he could nоt have been relieved by motion in arrest or motion for new trial. There was no motion to quash or plea in abatеment filed.
2. Complaint is made that daring the trial a witness for the State was asked what one Noah Harman had told him, the witness, аnd was permitted to relate what he had been told by Harman concerning the commission of the offense and the рart taken therein by the ac
The objections were in substance : 1st; that the statement to Harman was made out of the hearing of the accused; 2d, that there was no conspiracy first proved to exist between the acсused and said Harman before the question was asked; and 3d, that if such conspiracy had been shown to exist, when the statеment was made by Harman to the witness, the alleged common purpose must have ended, as it was made after the commission of the offense.
• It appears that Harman had been jointly charged, in the information, with Buchanan, with stealing сattle. That both had been arrested and had been released on bond, but BuchanaD alone was tried. That the statеment of Harman, admitted in evidence, was made after the parties thus jointly charged had been arrested and released on bond.
If any purpoge, plan or conspiracy existed between these parties to commit the оffense charged, after the commission of the offense and their arrest therefor such conspiracy or common рurpose would, it is clear, have been consummated or at an end.
It is elementary, that the statement respecting such offense, made out of the hearing of the accused, by his co-conspirator, after the conspiraсy has ended, is inadmissible.
Wharton thus expresses the law on this point:
“ The distinction appears to be well settled between the admissibility of declarations acсompanying the acts of conspirators and statements subsequently made, as evidence against the rest.
“ This co-responsibility holds good without regard to the time in which the party entered the combination. He becomes responsible for every act which may afterwards be done by any one of the others, in furtherance of the common design. When, hоwever, the common enterprise is at an end, whether by accomplishment or abandonment, no one of the conspirators is permitted by subsequent act or declarations of his own to affect the others. His confession, therefore, subsequently made, is not admissible in evidence as such against any but himself.” Wharton, Secs. 702, 705; Bishop’s Crim. Proc., vol. 2, Sec. 230; 29 An. 354; 31 An. 860.
The statement in question was admitted by the Judge, as appears from the bill of exceptions, for the reason that the pаrties had been co-conspirators in the commission of the offense charged, and because he, the Judge, bеlieved that when the statement was made by Harman, he and Buchanan were at that very time engaged i,n an attempt to deceive the witness, in order to make evidence for themselves on the then approaching trial.
If the declarаtion is made whilst the conspiracy' is still on foot, it . must refer exclusively to the offense or the commission of the offense, for w'hich the party is tried. If, after the offense is committed, a plan is formed by the two offenders for any purpose rеlating to their trial, this fact cannot render admissible the declaration of one of the parties against the othеr, concerning their first offense, though made during the existence of his last or new conspiracy about the evidencе. Such a circumstance has no real bearing on the question presented, and the Judge should have given it no consideration.
We are satisfied that this statement of the accomplice was greatly to the prejudice of the dеfendant, and its admission constitutes so grave an error as to invalidate the conviction.
It is, therefore, ordered, аdjudged and decreed that the conviction and sentence appealed from be annulled, avoided and rеversed, and that the case be remanded, to be proceeded with according to law and the views herein expressed.