People v. Sica

KNIGHT, J.

On October 23, 1924, Norval M. Hyde, twenty-one years of age, was killed by the accidental discharge of a shotgun in the hands of the defendant Angelo Sica, seventeen years of age, while the latter was pointing the gun, in play, at Hyde. Sica was informed against by the district attorney for the crime of manslaughter, and upon trial was convicted, the jury recommending leniency. After denying a plea for probation, the trial court sentenced Sica to imprisonment in the state prison at San Quentin. Sica has appealed, and for a reversal of judgment urges two principal grounds—first, insufficiency of evidence, and, secondly, errors of the trial court in the matter of giving instructions to the jury, which he claims deprived him of a fair trial.

The circumstances leading up to and attending the death of Hyde, as shown by the evidence, were as follows: Hyde and a young man named Far linger were employed on certain premises near Fresno operated as a gun club, and lived in a tent on the property. Hyde and Sica were friends. About a week previous to the fatal shooting Sica had called on Hyde at the gun club’s property and was invited by Hyde to visit him again. On the day of the accident Sica and three boy companions went for a ride in an automobile belonging to one of the boys and, being in the vicinity of the gun club, went over to see Hyde, arriving at the gun club about 5 o ’clock in the afternoon. As they drove in, Farlinger was working in a ditch near by and Hyde rode up on horseback from the field. After an exchange of greetings all around, Hyde and Sica shaking hands in a friendly manner, the boys proceeded to chop an old log lying on the ground into firewood, and then engaged in target practice with a revolver which one of Sica’s companions had brought with him. During the target practice Sica went into the

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tent, and brought out a double-barreled hammerless shotgun and two cartridges, inserting the cartridges in the gun on his way out of the tent. After loading the gun he pointed it at the fence and other objects, whereupon the other boys warned him to “be careful with that gun” and to “look out for that gun, it is loaded—accidents happen”; notwithstanding these admonitions, Sica pointed the gun at Hyde, who was still astride the horse, fifteen or twenty feet distant. As Sica pointed the gun at Hyde, one of the boys again warned him to be careful, and Hyde laughingly said to Sica, according to the testimony of Farlinger and another boy named Vaccaro, “Don’t point that gun at me, you bastard, or I’ll pull this on you,” or words to that effect, exhibiting the pistol with which he and the others had been shooting at the target. A few seconds later the gun was accidentally discharged, the load striking Hyde in the left side of the back, and he fell from the horse. Sica, dropping the gun, exclaimed, “God, what did I do!” and rushed to Hyde’s assistance. The boys lifted Hyde into the automobile and hurried him to the hospital, but he died before arriving there. According to Vaccaro’s testimony, Sica at the time the gun was discharged, was holding it with the butt to his shoulder, pointing it at Hyde, although not aiming it at him. L. Saladino, another boy, testified in regard to this point as follows: “I looked around again and saw Angelo pointing the gun at Hyde, and Hyde said, ‘Look out, you bastard, don’t shoot me, or I will pull this on you.’ So when he says that, Angelo Sica turned the gun away and then put it up again in a position like this, toward his waist-line, and held it there a matter of a few seconds, and then put it up a little higher, and they were joking and laughing again, him and Hyde, and he said, ‘Don’t point that gun at me. What the hell is the matter with you, you damn fool?’ And Angelo Sica was laughing and I looked around to see the well they were drilling, and heard a report, and I turned around and saw Hyde fall off the. horse.” Sica’s statement, taken by a deputy district attorney on the night following the accident, and afterwards introduced in evidence at the trial as part of the People’s ease, was in substantial accord with the versions given by his companions. Although he could give no accurate account of the exact cause for the discharge of the gun, he stated that he was pointing it at Hyde,