People v. Messersmith

Citations

• 61 Cal. 246
• 1882 Cal. LEXIS 591

Syllabus

<p>Homicide—Instruction—Insanity—Burden of Proof—Preponderance of Evidence.—Where a person accused of crime relies on the defense of insanity he is bound to establish it by such a preponderance of evidence that if the question were submitted to a jury in a civil case they would find him insane.</p> <p>Id.—Id.—Province of. Court—Jury—Assumption of Pact.—It is error for a Court to assume the existence of a fact which is not in evidence or which is to he determined by the jury on evidence, however slight, or on a conflict of evidence. The jury are the exclusive judges of the credibility of witnesses, the weight of testimony and of the facts established and the presumptions of fact deducible from them.</p> <p>Id.—Id.—Id.—Id.—Id.—Such an instruction, however, if otherwise unobjectionable, is not erroneous if the fact which is assumed in it is one not controverted by the evidence.</p> <p>Id.—Id.—Id.—Id.—Presumption of Law and Pact.—Where a Court unqualifiedly tells the jury as a matter of law, that an assumed fact does not prove a fact in dispute, it is error. Such a charge should not be given when it is necessary to draw an inference of fact; an inference of fact, where it does not arise as a presumption of law, must be drawn by the jury, whose duty it is to pass upon the sufficiency, or insufficiency of the evidence.</p> <p>Id.—Id.—Id.—-Id.—Id.—The Court therefore erred in telling the jury that a tendency to commit suicide does not prove insanity. It, however, withdrew from that position by immediately telling them, that as a fact, it was a matter for their consideration, in connection with all the other facts and circumstances in the case. Thus qualified there was no error in the instruction.</p> <p>Id.—Id.—Id—The Court instructed the jury: “Where the evidence of- the case shows that there was strong motive of anger, jealousy, or hate, actuating the accused, such motive as might naturally induce a man of depraved and wicked heart, and violent, ungovernable passions to