Opinion
March 2, 1951.
Appeal from the Circuit Court, Palm Beach County, C.E. Chillingworth, J.
Robert E. Hathaway, West Palm Beach, for appellant.
Richard W. Ervin, Atty. Gen., and Murray Sams, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
It appears by the record in this cause that an unidentified body, on November 10, 1949, was found floating in a canal about one mile west of 20-Mile Bend in Palm Beach County, Florida. The body was later identified as Charles R. Summerlin, of Palatka, Florida. The cause of death, according to the medical testimony, was a severe concussion or possibly a fractured skull. The wound could have been caused by a blow on the head or by the head striking some hard object or substance. Summerlin, by trade a painter, left his home at Palatka for Fort Pierce on November 2, 1949, driving a 1936 Plymouth automobile. In the automobile were some paint, paint brushes, painting equipment and wearing apparel.
The appellant, Leroy Williams, was seen at a filling station around 8:00 or 9:00 o'clock P.M., November 2, 1949, at Sebastian, Florida, driving a 1935 or 1936 Plymouth automobile and in it with Williams was a white man. Williams arrived at Belle Glade around 2:00 or 3:00 o'clock A.M., November 3, 1949, in possession of the Summerlin automobile and several articles of his wearing apparel. He told some of the officers that he bought the automobile from a party then residing at Cocoa, and to his friends and associates he stated that his brother at Savannah, Georgia, gave him the automobile and many of the articles then in the car, which later were shown to have been in the car when Summerlin left Palatka.
According to appellant Williams he hitch-hiked from some point in the State of Virginia to a point north of Sebastian, where he was picked up by the deceased in the Plymouth automobile when traveling from Palatka to the lower east coast in search of work. The appellant's destination was Belle Glade, where he had previously resided and worked. Shortly after Summerlin's body was taken from the canal, Leroy Williams was arrested. He asserted ownership of the Plymouth automobile and the numerous articles in the car which the deceased had with him on November 2, 1949, at the time of leaving Palatka. He told officers that he killed Summerlin, rifled his pockets and threw his body into the canal. He took about $18.00 from the body and drove away from the scene of the killing in the deceased's automobile. In explanation of the confession of guilt, he later stated that the officers whipped him and forced him to make the confession. He pointed to bruises on his body alleged to have been inflicted by the officers, but no credible testimony in the record corroborated the appellant's testimony in whole or in part on this point.
An indictment charging Leroy Williams with the death of Charles R. Summerlin was rendered by a grand jury of Palm Beach County. Counsel was by the trial court appointed to defend Williams. He was placed upon trial and by a jury convicted of the crime of murder in the first degree, without recommendation, and the trial court imposed the death penalty on the verdict of the jury. The appellant appealed. The appellant, during the course of the trial, admitted that he was in the automobile when Summerlin was killed by a boy by the name of "Charles Brown" and the body thrown in the canal, and "Charles Brown" robbed the deceased of about $18.00 or $20.00 after killing him; "Charles Brown" gave the appellant a part of the money taken from Summerlin's dead body. Two or three defense witnesses testified that there was a stranger about Belle Glade dressed in "city clothes" rather than "country clothes" and this stranger was in company with appellant. Many other witnesses testified during the trial that they never knew "Charles Brown" and left the impression, at the most, that "Charles Brown" was a mythical character.
On appeal here it is contended: (1) the indictment was fatally defective; (2) the confession of Williams was unconstitutionally obtained; (3) the evidence of the corpus delicti was legally insufficient; (4) the evidence is legally insufficient to support the verdict and judgment entered below. We have given careful consideration to each of the above contentions and it is our conclusion that ample testimony appears in the record to support the verdict and judgment of the lower Court. The constitutional rights of the appellant were observed at each step during the progress of the trial. We fail to find reversible error in the record.
Affirmed.
SEBRING, C.J., and TERRELL, THOMAS, ADAMS, HOBSON and ROBERTS, JJ., concur.