19 Wash. 435 | Wash. | 1898
The opinion of the court was delivered by
The appellant was tried in the superior court of Island county on the charge of murder in the first degree, found guilty of murder in the second degree, and sentenced to imprisonment in the penitentiary for the period of twenty years. Prom the judgment of conviction he has appealed. The motion of the prosecuting attorney to dismiss the appeal and the further motion to strike the statement of facts are considered by the court to be without merit and they are therefore denied.
There are but three assignments of error to be considered in this case. The first is that the prosecution was not commenced within three years after the commission of the offense and is consequently barred by the statute of limitations. The information alleges that the offense was committed on or about the 11th day of July, 1894. Section 1188, 2 Hill’s Code (Bal. Code, § 6780) is as follows:
“ Prosecutions for the offenses of murder and arson, where death ensues, may be commenced at any period after the commission of the offense; for offenses the punishment of which may be imprisonment in the penitentiary, within three years after their commission; . . . .”
The next assignment is that the court committed error in permitting witness Garrison — a brother of the deceased —to testify on re-direct examination to the contents of a letter purporting to have been written by the deceased
The remaining question for consideration is, was the evidence sufficient to justify.the verdict? The offense was alleged to have been committed on Whidby Island in July, 1894, near the village of Chicago. In the month of June and in the fore part of July, 1894, the deceased, Finley Garrison, was stopping in the city of Seattle seeking employment. It was fully established that the defendant was in his company at that place and roomed with him at the Queen City hotel for a couple of nights. While there, on July 8, 1894, deceased had a conversation with witness Bruce — with whom he was acquainted — and in the course of that conversation stated to the witness that he was going to Whidby Island to engage in work, driving a team in a logging camp. In the course of that conversation the defendant came up and was introduced by the deceased to the witness as “ the man that he was going to work for.” On July 3, 1894, the deceased wrote to his brother that he had hired out to drive a team for a period of six months. It was shown that in the early part of June the defendant had upwards of a hundred dollars in money on his person. On or about the 9th of July, 1894, the deceased went to Whidby Island for the first time. He was a stranger at that place, where the defendant was then residing in the family of his father. Several witnesses
Scott, O. J., and Andees, Dunbar and Reavis, JJ., concur.