People v. Crews

Citations

• 102 Cal. 174
• 36 P. 367
• 1894 Cal. LEXIS 613

Syllabus

<p>Criminal Law—Homicide—Evidence—Dying Declaration.—Upon the trial of a defendant accused of homicide, a written statement of the circumstances attending the shooting, which was reduced to writing, and signed and verified by the affidavit of the deceased, at a time when he was not impressed with a sense of impending death, but which was reaffirmed as a true and correct account of the facts after knowledge of impending death, is properly received as a dying declaration; and the reaffirmation of the matters set forth in the statement when all hope of recovery had gone is sufficient to constitute a repetition or restatement of the same matters, and with the same effect as if such matters had then been reduced to writing and signed.</p> <p>Id.—Recollection of Prior Statement—Rereading.—Where the evidence leaves it clear that when the deceased reaffirmed the correctness of the prior statement he had a clear recollection of its contents, the fact that it was not then reread to him is immaterial.</p>