Opinion
01-01-1825
Josiah Poore v. The Commonwealth
This was an application for a Writ of Error to a judgment of the Superior Court of Law for Cumberland county, by which the prisoner was convicted of manslaughter, and sentenced to imprisonment in the Penitentiary for two years.
After the verdict, the prisoner moved for a new trial, on the following grounds. He introduced three witnesses, all of whom proved that one of the jury who had been elected by the prisoner, and brought in the verdict, declared, a few days before the sitting of the Court, that from what he had heard by flying reports, if he should be on the jury, and the same should prove to be true, he should be for hanging the prisoner; they also stated that the juryman said he had been summoned to attend Court as a venire-man, and hoped the prisoner would refuse to be tried by him. The prisoner also introduced another witness, who proved he had given to the said juryman a particular account of what he knew, as a witness in the Case, respecting some threats made by the deceased against the prisoner, but he had not been a witness on any former occasion; on which, the said juryman declared, that upon that statement there could not be a jury got in the county, that could do otherwise than acquit him; and that he, the witness, communicated the same to the prisoner before the trial; the witness also stated, that the evidence which he gave on the trial, was to the same effect of the statement made to the juryman.
The Court over-ruled the motion, and refused to grant the new trial, being satisfied that the verdict against the prisoner was, from the Law and evidence of the Case, rather merciful than severe; but especially because the juryman referred to, was sworn before he was elected, and said that he had never heard the testimony on any former trial, nor had any person who did hear it, given him an account of what had been proved, that he recollected; but that he had heard various accounts about it, as rumored in the county; that notwithstanding any thing he had heard, his mind was free, unbiased, and without prejudice either way, and that he felt no doubt but that he could give the prisoner a fair and impartial trial, according to the evidence and Law in the Case, as the same should appear before him in Court, without regard to any thing he had heard out of Court; whereupon, the prisoner elected him.
The prisoner excepted to the Court's opinion, refusing to grant him a new trial.
In his petition to this Court for a Writ of Error, he maintained there was error, for the following reasons:
" 1. Because it is manifest, from the facts set out in the record, that the mind of one of the jurymen, who concurred in the verdict of " guilty," if not fully made up to convict, before he heard the evidence in the Cause, was at least laboring under so strong a prejudice against the petitioner, as to make him an incompetent juror."
" 2. Because the same juryman, by his declaration, that if certain facts should be in proof, (which were in proof upon the trial,) a jury could not be obtained in the county that could do otherwise than acquit, induced the petitioner not to press his right of challenge for cause, nor to exercise his peremptory right of challenge; both of which he would have done, but for the deceptive conduct of the juryman."
OPINION
By the Court.
The Writ of Error is unanimously refused.