Cummins v. Crawford

Citations

• 88 Ill. 312

Syllabus

<p>1. Threats * — as a justification for shooting. Threats of the plaintiff, made some twenty days before, to take the life of the defendant, without proof of any attempt to execute them, either before or at the time of the shootifig, is no justification for the defendant’s shooting and wounding the plaintiff, although the latter, when approaching in the direction of the place where the defendant was, had a gun on his shoulder, but did not see the defendant until after he was shot, and there was plenty of time for the defendant to have got away after he saw the plaintiff approaching.</p> <p>2. Where the defendant, being well armed with a double-barreled gun, and sitting in the road, saw the plaintiff, who had made threats to kill him, coming towards Mm in the road with a gun on his shoulder, concealed himself, and while the plaintiff was not aware of his being in the vicinity, and without any hostile demonstration on his part to excite any apprehension of serious danger, took deliberate aim and shot the plaintiff, when he could easily have got away before the plaintiff came up, and the defendant stated that he intended, at the time, to kill the plaintiff, it was held, that the defendant’s act was without a shadow of justification in law.</p> <p>3. Before a party may attack or inflict bodily harm upon a person who has made threats to take Ms life, however well founded his apprehensions may be, there must be some overt act from which an intention may be reasonably inferred to carry into effect the threats of personal violence, and that the danger is imminent.</p> <p>4. Evidence—of previous threats. In trespass, for shooting and wounding the plaintiff, the defendant offered to prove by witnesses that, they had heard the plaintiff make threats against the life of defendant some twenty days before the shooting, which evidence the court excluded: Held, that the evidence was properly excluded, and that it was not admissible even in mitigation of damages.</p> <p>5. Unless t