People v. Hill

McFARLAND, J. The defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree, and was sentenced to a life imprisonment in the state prison. He appeals from the judgment and from an order denying a new trial. The appellant is a youth, and at the time of the homicide upon which the charge of murder was based he was only eighteen years and some months old. The homicide occurred on a road about a mile and a half from a resort known as the Fresno Hot Springs, at which place there was a hotel, saloon, croquet ground, et cetera. About 9 o’clock in the evening of June 27, 1897, the appellant left said springs in a buggy with a young companion named Tony Loveall, to go to his home, which was about five or six miles distant. At the same time the deceased, Lloyd Duke, also left the springs in a buggy, in which were also two other persons named Smoot and Taylor. All these persons had been together in the saloon at the springs, where something had been said about a bet on a wrestle between the defendant and the deceased, in which the deceased said that he would either wrestle or fight the defendant. Some months before that time the deceased had whipped the appellant at another place. After the parties had started the buggies were brought close together several times, and each had ' passed the other, and there was considerable rough and angry .talk between the parties. Smoot was left at his house, which was a short distance from the springs. At that time the buggy in which the appellant rode was ahead, and, some of the harness being disarranged or broken, the appellant had stopped his buggy and had gone to the side of one of his horses to repair the harness. At this point, which was about one and a half miles from the springs, the deceased and Taylor overtook the appellant, and there is testimony that the deceased in an angry manner asked the appellant and his companion what they were doing, and said, "Stop, you sons of hitches; I will fix you.” The deceased then jumped out of his buggy on the ground, when the appellant, who had returned to his buggy, also jumped to the ground, taking with him a gun which had been in the buggy, and hollered to the deceased, "Stop.” The parties were then very close together, but it was dark and dusty, so that the movements of the deceased and the appellant could not he very distinctly seen. Immediately afterward the appellant fired a shot, which caused the [49]death of the deceased. The appellant testified that he thought", the deceased, who was an older and larger man, was about to-attack him, and that he shot in self-defense. The parties were-all boisterous and noisy and seemed to act with a good deal' of recklessness. There was testimony to the effect that the.defendant sought to prevent the deceased from passing him in. his buggy; and there are many other circumstances not necessary to be detailed under the views we take of the case.