32 Fla. 315 | Fla. | 1893
The plaintiff in error was indicted, tried and convicted of murder in the first degree in the Marion Circuit Court, and the sentence of death was passed upon him. He has sued out a writ of error to this court, ;and various assignments of error are made here.
We are confronted with an error in the record before us which, according to well established rules of law, will necessitate • a reversal of the judgment. A witness — Enoch Butler — was introduced by the State, .and testified that he was at the place called the commissary on the afternoon of the day the deceased was killed and saw the accused there. He also stated that he was standing at the east side of the house between sundown and dusk, and the deceased was paying off hands; heard him say something about not paying off the hands that night, and defendant said: “I am going to have my money, you d-d old son of a b-h; if you don’t pay me I am going to kill you.” He was also asked how he happened “to beat that commissary that evening,” and stated that he went there to collect for some pork, potatoes and things he had sold to the hands getting cross-ties. On cross-examination the witness was asked “what kind of a building was that commissary?” The State objected to the
We do not deem it necessary to refer to the other assignments of error made.
The judgment is reversed and a new trial awarded,