Cook v. State
Cook v. State
Opinion of the Court
The state offered evidence showing that on the night of October 6, 1916, the building occupied and used by Clyde Thompson and Jerry Maxey as a shop for cleaning and pressing clothes, and in which clothes were kept for such purpose, was broken into and entered, and that clothes of the value of $175 were taken therefrom. The breaking and entry was through the back door, which the undisputed evidence shows was closed and barred by the witness Maxey, on the night of the burglary, and the next morning the door was standing open, and several suits of clothes and one or more dresses were missing. The state also offered evidence tending to connect the defendant and one Pete Moore with the offense, and to show that they were confederates in the crime. The court allowed the state, over the timely objection of the defendant, to offer evidence of a confession made by Moore in the presence of the defendant to the witness Guttery while Williams, the sheriff of Conecuh county, Kendall, his deputy, and another were present. The only predicate on which the confession was admitted was the testimony of Guttery to the effect that he offered Moore no inducements and made him no promises, and made against him no threats. Before the testimony of the confession was given, the *391 defendant objected to its admission, and proposed to show that a week or ten days before this alleged confession was made Williams and Kendall and the other person present, by abuse and threats, coerced from Moore in defendant’s presence a like confession. The court refused to hear this testimony, overruled the defendant’s objection, and permitted the state to offer proof of the confession. After the state offered all its evidence in chief and had closed, the defendant testified as a witness and gave testimony to the effect that Williams, Kendall, and the other person present, when Moore made the confession to Guttery, a few days before Guttery came to Evergreen and while the defendant and Moore were confined in the county jail of Conecuh county, under the charge for which the defendant was tried, in the presence and hearing of defendant, put a rope around Moore’s neck and pulled him up as if they were going to hang him, and threatened to kill him unless he confessed to the crime, and threatened the defendant if he disputed Moore’s confession, and in this way obtained a confession from Moore. The testimony given by defendant in rebuttal of the predicate on which the confession was made was undisputed, and at the conclusion of all the testimony in the case the defendant made a motion to exclude the testimony given by Guttery relative to the confession, and this motion was overruled.
“It is the duty of the trial court, in all cases, before permitting such confessions to be shown, 'to ascertain that they are voluntary.” Fortner v. State, supra; Whatley v. State, supra.
“The province and duty of the court and of the jury are essentially separate and distinct, and neither can assume the duty or invade the province of the other. The court adjudged the confessions were prima facie voluntary, and therefore competent and admissible evidence. As competent * * * the jury were bound to receive them” (Young v. State, 68 Ala. 580), but as to what weight the confession is entitled to in solving the issues is a matter exclusively within the province of the jury.
“So when a confession has been once obtained through the influence of hope or fear, confessions of a similar character, subsequently made, as is uniformly held, may be inferred to have originated from the same motive, and, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, showing that the original influence had ceased, or been dispelled, they are inadmissible.” Redd v. State, 69 Ala. 255.
Reversed and remanded.
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