People v. Eubanks

Foote, C. The defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree, and is under sentence of death. He appeals from the judgment therein rendered, and from the order denying a new trial. The main ground upon which he bases his contention for a reversal of the judgment and order is, that the court gave, in its charge to the jury, of its own motion, among other things, this instruction: “ Upon the issue of insanity, the evidence must he such in amount that if the single issue of the sanity or insanity of the defendant should be submitted to yon [296]in a civil case you should find that he was insane. In all other matters, except that of insanity, the defendant is entitled to the benefit of every reasonable doubt.”

The claim of the defendant is, to quote the language of his closing brief: “ The appellant does not claim that he is innocent. He does not claim that he ought not to. be punished. But he does claim that the facts in this case do not warrant a punishment of death; that he is only guilty of murder in the second degree, and if guilty of murder in the first degree, the death penalty should not be affixed. He bases this contention upon the proposition that, from the long and excessive use of intoxicating liquors, and from inheritance from his mother, he was, at the time of the homicide, and for a long time prior thereto, of a weak and enfeebled mind, and incapable, by reason of this mental infirmity, of conceiving that malice requisite to constitute murder in the first degree.”

His defense on the trial, as stated by his counsel in the presence of the court, and to the jury, was: “ That the defense in this case stands in the remarkable attitude, from beginning to end, that the defendant was guilty of the crime of murder, but they would endeavor to establish that the defendant inherited from an insane mother an impaired mentality; that, at the time of the homicide, the defendant’s mind had been further weakened by a long and continuous use of alcoholic liquors, and that his mental condition was such at the time of the homicide that he should not be adjudged guilty of murder in the first degree, or, at least, he should not be subjected to the death penalty; that, as the law divided murder into first and second degrees, the defense would offer testimony showing the impaired mental condition of the defendant’s mind, for the purpose of rebutting malice, and for the purpose of reducing the degree of crime from the first to the second degree, or if they failed in that, still the law permitted the jury to affix imprison[297]