Commonwealth v. Berkenbush

Citations

• 267 Pa. 455
• 110 A. 263
• 1920 Pa. LEXIS 889

Syllabus

<p>Criminal law — Murder—Degrees—Murder of second degree— Presumption — Insanity—Evidence—Charge — Jury to determine degree — Constitutional right of defendant.</p> <p>1. On the trial of an indictment for murder, the accused may not plead guilty of murder of the first degree. The law presumes that the offense is murder of the second degree, and the burden is on the Commonwealth to prove that a felonious homicide had been committed, and that there existed in the killing every ingredient or essential element of murder of the first degree.</p> <p>2. Such burden remains unchanged throughout the entire case —exactly where it stood when the case opened, and so continues until it closes. The burden never shifts. Whenever the evidence is all in, if the Commonwealth has not, on the whole evidence, by whichever side introduced, established beyond a reasonable doubt the guilt of the accused and the degree that it contends for, the accused is entitled to an acquittal or to such verdict as is called for by meeting this burden. The burden on the Commonwealth is not discharged until the jury has solemnly adjudicated these facts.</p> <p>3. When the trial judge instructs the jury that “they may find a verdict of murder of the first degree, murder of the second degree or manslaughter,” he entirely nullifies such instruction by subsequently saying, “If he is not insane, then he is guilty of murder of the first degree.”</p> <p>4. On the trial of an indictment for murder, where the defense is insanity, and the trial judge, without impropriety, tells the jury that the Commonwealth’s evidence standing alone, if believed, would be murder of the first degree, he commits reversible error by further charging as follows: “The defendant, however, sets up that he was not responsible for his actions at the time he killed his wife......If the perpetrator of an offense of this character is insane, the law does not hold him responsible......Now has he satisfied you, by a fair preponderance of the ev