People v. Kelley

HART, J.

The defendant, under an information charging him with the crime of murder, was convicted at the trial of murder of the second degree.

From the judgment and the order denying him a new trial he takes this appeal.

The homicide occurred on the twenty-second day of January, 1907, in the county jail at Susanville, the defendant having been arrested and confined in said jail on that day upon

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suspicion that he was insane. The sheriff, who made the arrest, employed the deceased, Perry Stout, to remain with and guard the defendant during the night of the day of the arrest. At about the hour of 12 o’clock that night one Packard, a night watchman and deputy sheriff, went to the jail with food or “supper” for Stout and the prisoner. On reaching the inside of the jail he found Stout lying dead on the floor. Death, it was learned upon investigation by the sheriff, who had been summoned to the jail immediately upon the discovery of Stout’s death, and by the autopsy physician, who later examined the body, was caused by knife wounds.

The defendant, as stated, had been arrested on the supposition that he was insane. He had been engaged as a laborer on tunnel work for the Western Pacific Railway, and was placed under arrest by the sheriff at a point on the line of said railway known as “Camp No. One.” The evidence discloses that the defendant had been on a protracted “spree,” or under a state of alcoholic intoxication for a number of days previous to his arrest, and that his actions prior to and at the time of his said arrest were so unusual and queer that it was generally believed by his acquaintances that he had lost his reason. The sheriff was notified of the conduct of the defendant and was requested to place him in custody, and, in obedience to said request, arrested and confined him in the county jail, as already related.

The defendant did not deny killing Stout, but interposed the defense that, at the time of the commission of the homicide, he was insane.

On the fourth day of February the district attorney was about to proceed with the arraignment of the defendant upon the information filed against him, when, upon a suggestion by counsel representing the accused, the court, by the authority of section 1368 of the Penal Code, made an order, reciting that a doubt existed as to the sanity of the prisoner, and that the question of his sanity be submitted to a jury. Thereupon a jury was summoned and impaneled to try the question of defendant’s mental condition. The jury, after hearing evidence, returned a verdict “that said alleged insane person is at the present time insane.” Upon this verdict, the judge of the superior court made an order committing the accused to the Napa state hospital for the insane.