Cluverius v. Commonwealth

Citations

• 81 Va. 787
• 1886 Va. LEXIS 144

Syllabus

<p>1. Corporation Courts—Terms.—Under Code 1873, chapter 154, sec tions 26 and 36, corporation courts have authority to continue a term from day to day into the next succeeding month, and to change accordingly the day for the commencement of the succeeding term.</p> <p>2. Criminal Proceedings—Discharging veniremen—It is not error in the trial court to discharge a venireman, who had previously expressed opinions repugnant to inflicting capital punishment, on circumstantial evidence; or who had made a bet on the result of the trial.</p> <p>3. Idem—Capital cases—Juries.—Hall’s Case, 80 Va. 555, approved as to mode of selecting jury.</p> <p>4. Idem—Examination of witnesses.—Questions are not leading which merely direct the witness’ attention to the subject as to which he is questioned, without suggesting the answer.</p> <p>5. Idem—Evidence—Admissibility.—Where the evidence established that the deceased left Bath for Richmond on the 12th, assigning as her reasons for leaving, the contents of a letter then exhibited and read, and that early on the 14th, she was found dead in Richmond, under circumstances indicating she had been murdered, that letter was admissible in evidence for the prosecution, as part of the res gestee, or of those acts—verbal, or written, or done—which stand in caused relation to the crime. And so, likewise, a note addressed on the 13th in the handwriting of the deceased, from Room No. 21 of the hotel in Richmond, to the accused, under circumstances indicating it was written by the deceased to the accused in answer to a note addressed to the occupant of that room, is admissible as part of the res gestee, and also for the purpose of identifying that occupant with the deceased, and of showing that she was in communication with him on the day of her death.</p> <p>6. Idem—Indictment—Verdict.—An indictment in the common law form for murder, charges both degrees of murder, and a verdict finding the accused guilty of murder in the first degree, as charged in