People v. Letoile

CONREY, P. J.

Defendant was convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for the crime of incest committed with his eldest daughter. His appeal is from the judgment and from an order denying his motion for a new trial.

Testimony directly supporting the charge was given by the prosecuting witness, the daughter of the defendant. It was claimed by the defendant that according to her own testimony she had consented to the acts constituting the ground of complaint, and that she being therefore an accomplice, the conviction cannot be sustained without corroborative evidence tending to connect the defendant with the commission of the offense.

The only corroborative evidence found in the record is contained in the testimony of Mary Letoile, a sister of the prosecuting witness, Lucy Letoile, which testimony was admitted over objections thereto. This witness was called by the prosecution as a witness in rebuttal, and was questioned about trouble between herself and her father at about the time of his arrest. This question was asked by the district attorney: “About that time and for some time previous thereto, had you had trouble with him with regard to his acts of sexual intimacy with you?” After an objection had been made and overruled, she answered that question in the affirmative. Evidence was thus placed before the jury not only by the prosecuting witness that the defendant had committed the crime of incest with her, but also by the daughter Mary that defendant had committed a like crime with her. Unless this was corroboration of Lucy’s testimony respecting the offense charged in this action, there is no corroboration in the record. The jury may have believed Lucy’s testimony as to the defendant’s acts, but that those acts were done with her consent and that she was an accomplice therein; and in that event their verdict was necessarily based also upon the testimony of Mary, which tended to show the defendant’s disposition to commit that kind of a crime by showing that he had com

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mitted such a crime with a person other than the one named in the information. The decisions in this state are uniform to the effect that such evidence in prosecutions for crimes of this class is not admissible.

(People