Commonwealth v. Webb

Citations

• 252 Pa. 187
• 97 A. 189
• 1916 Pa. LEXIS 592

Syllabus

<p>Criminal law — Murder—Manslaughter—Provocation—Deliberation — Premeditation—Reasonable doubt — \Character” — \Reputation” — Evidence—Photographs—Burden of proof — Charge of court.</p> <p>1. IJhgoverned and uncontrolled temper is no defense to crime, and does not even reduce killing to manslaughter unless it is produced by immediate and legally sufficient provocation.</p> <p>2. In charging the jury in a homicide casé, the trial judge is not bound to repeat fully the general legal principles applicable to the case every time he takes up a new phase of the evidence. If the charge when interpreted as a whole is a correct and impartial presentation of the ease, it will be .sustained, though particular portions of it, considered alone, may not be an exact and complete statement of the law.</p> <p>3. On the trial of an indictment for murder by the defendant of his wife, it appeared that they had lived together harmoniously until the quarrel resulting in the killing; that on the night prior thereto there was a dispute between defendant and his wife as to money matters; that on the following morning the argument was resumed and during a scuffling which ensued his wife seized a poker and struck defendant on the head, and defendant then cut her five times with a razor, one of the,cuts proving fatal. The fact of killing was admitted and the only question was the degree of crime. It appeared that defendant was about six feet in height and weighed 165 pounds, and that his wife was five feet seven' inches in height and weighed from 200 to 250 pounds, and that the poker used by her was a small one about fifteen inches in length and a quarter of an inch in diameter. The court defined malice as follows: “As ordinarily understood, malice means spite or ill will— hatred; but in law malice means more than that. It of course does include spite and ill will, but it means where a person acts cruelly, with hardness of heart, or in reckless disregard of the consequence of the act.” The co