Williams v. People

Citations

• 54 Ill. 422

Syllabus

<p>1, Criminal law—organization of a grand jury. While it is usual, and would be more formal, to insert in the record in a criminal case, the names of the persons composing the grand jury who found the indictment, yet it is not essential, to support a verdict of guilty, that the record should affirmatively show even that the requisite number of grand jurors was present at the time of the organization of the body.</p> <p>2. So where the record in a case where the defendant was convicted upon the charge of murder, showed that the grand jury who found the indictment “ was called, impanelled and sworn,” and that a foreman was appointed, it was 7teld, the necessary intendment was, that the grand jury so sworn was properly organized.</p> <p>3. Evidence in cbiminal cases—in respect to a conspiracy. When life and liberty are at stake, every circumstance connected with the alleged crime, and which may tend to excuse or palliate the conduct of the party charged, or explain the motives, should be submitted to the jury.</p> <p>4. On the trial of a party charged with murder, the evidence tended to show that the fatal blow was struck while the prisoner and the deceased were engaged in a fight, which was the result of a conspiracy between deceased and several others “ to clean out or whip ” the prisoner and his friends, the arrangement being that deceased should make the attack upon the prisoner, which he did: Held, it was competent for the prisoner to prove what was done by the parties, in pursuance of that plan or arrangement, to carry into effect the objects of the conspiracy, if one existed.</p> <p>5. Knowledge of the conspiracy had come to the prisoner, and the full development of the facts, as shown in the acts of the parties in the prosecution of their unlawful purpose, was proper, as tending to explain the animus of deceased at the time of the conflict, and also to enable the jury to determine whether the prisoner was prompted by a reasonable and well-grounded belief that