Commonwealth v. Puntario

Citations

• 271 Pa. 501
• 115 A. 831
• 1922 Pa. LEXIS 745

Syllabus

<p>Criminal law — Murder — Dying declarations — Evidence — Bes gestas.</p> <p>1. Dying declarations cannot be received unless the statement of the deceased was made under the belief that he was about to die.</p> <p>2. The sense of impending death which the dying person must have had in order to render a dying declaration admissible in evidence, may be inferred from the nature of the wound, without any express declaration to show that he was sensible of impending death.</p> <p>3. Whether belief in the approach of death was present when the declaration was made, is addressed in the first instance to the conscience of the court; but, after admission of the testimony, it is not error to charge that, before considering the declaration, the jury should be satisfied of the existence of this thought in the mind of the deceased at the time of its utterance.</p> <p>4. Where a dying declaration is made thirty minutes after the shooting, and as soon as the deceased was able to articulate, and from five to ten minutes before his death, the court, after admitting proof of the same, may properly suggest to the jury that the statement should not be considered if it found that the declaration was not made under sense of impending dissolution.</p> <p>5. When an unsworn statement is1 made as a part of the res geste, or under such circumstances as to make it a spontaneous one, it is admissible, and it need not be further shown that the assertion is also a dying declaration because made under a fixed sense of impending dissolution.</p> <p>6. Where a person who has been shot, makes a statement thirty minutes after the shooting, and as soon as he was able to articulate, such statement is admissible as a part of the res geste.</p> <p>Criminal law — Murder—Evidence—Loaded gun found in vicinity.</p> <p>A On the trial of an indictment for murder a loaded gun found • 4,200 feet from the place of the killing is properly admissible in evidence, where it appears that two of the chambers had been