Devine v. People

Citations

• 100 Ill. 290
• 1881 Ill. LEXIS 92

Syllabus

<p>1. Evidence—in capital cases. Where a person is on trial upon the charge of murder, and the evidence relied on to connect the accused with the offence is entirely circumstantial, it is highly important to him, as well as essential to the due administration of justice in the prosecution of the case, that the State should be held to at least a substantial, if not a strict, observance of the well established rules governing the production of testimony, in its efforts to establish the charge against him. No matter or thing should be admitted in evidence, against the objections of the accused, which does not prove or tend to prove the issue, more especially if the evidence, when admitted, would have an improper influence upon the minds of the jury, or place the accused at a disadvantage before them.</p> <p>2. Same—of the theory of witness and others as to guilty party. On the trial of one for murder, where the only evidence relied on to connect the prisoner- with the crime was circumstantial evidence, a captain of the police was allowed to testify that on the night of the homicide he saw another person and learned what he knew about the prisoner and another, and that he and the police formed the theory that the prisoner and such other person did the shooting of the deceased: Held, that the admission of this testimony was unjust to the accused, and clearly erroneous.</p> <p>3. Amending bidd of exceptions—in vacation. While the mere settling and signing of a bill of exceptions may not be the exercise of judicial power, yet when one is once signed, sealed, and filed in the proper office, it becomes a part of the record, and, like other portions of the record, it imports a verity, and no plea or averment will be admitted which questions the truth of what it imports.-</p> <p>4. If what purports to be a record has been so made up by the clerk or other officer as not to speak the real facts, it must be amended so as to conform to them, and this can only be done by the court