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DYING DECLARATIONS
(bouvier) | DYING DECLARATIONS. When a man has received a mortal wound or other injury,
by which he is in imminent danger of dying, and believes that he must die,
and afterwards does die, the statements he makes as to the manner in which
he received such injury, and the person who committed it, are called his
dying declarations.
2. These declarations are received in evidence against the person thus
accused, on the ground that the party making them can have no motive but to
tell the truth. The following lines have been put into the mouth of such a
man:
Have I not hideous Death before my view,
Retaining but a quantity of life,
Which bleeds away, even as a form of wax
Resolveth from his figure 'gainst the fire ?
What in the world should make me now deceive,
Since I must lose the use of all deceit?
Why then should I be false, since it is true
That I must die here, and live hence by truth.
See Death; Deathbed or dying declarations; Declarations.
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| | podobné slovo | definícia |
DEATH BED OR DYING DECLARATIONS
(bouvier) | DEATH BED OR DYING DECLARATIONS. In cases of homicide, those which are made
in extremis, when the person making them is conscious of his danger and has
given up all hopes of recovery, charging some other person or persons with
the murder. See 1 Phil. Ev. 200; Stark. Ev. part 4, p 458; 15 Johns. R. 288;
1 Hawk's R. 442; 2 Hawk's R. 31; McNally's Ev. 174; Swift's Ev. 124.
2. These declarations, contrary to the general rule that, hearsay is
not evidence, are constantly received. The principle of this exception is
founded partly on the situation of the dying person, which is considered to
be as powerful over his conscience as the obligation of an oath, and partly
on the supposed absence of interest on the verge of the next world, which
dispenses with a necessity of a cross-examination. But before such
declarations can be admitted in evidence against a prisoner, it must be
satisfactorily proved, that the deceased at the time of making them was
conscious of his danger and had given up all hopes of recovery. 1 Phil. Ev.
215, 216; Stark. Ev. part 4, p. 460.
3. They are admissible, as such, only in cases of homicide, where the
death of the deceased is the subject of the charge, and the circumstances of
the death are the subject of the dying declarations. 2 B. & C. 605; 15 John.
286: 4 C. & P. 233.Vide. 2 M. & Rob. 53.
4. The declarant must not have been incapable of a religious sense of
accountability to his Maker; for, if it appears that such religious sense
was wanting, whether it arose from infidelity, imbecility or tender age, the
declarations are alike inadmissible. 1 Greenl. Ev. Sec. 157; 1 Phil. Ev.
289; Phil. & Ani. Ev. 296; 2 Russ. on Cr. 688. See, in general, Bac. Abr.
Evidence, K; Addis. R. 832 East's P. C. 354, 356; 1 Stark. C. 522 2 Hayw. R.
31; 1 Hawk's R. 442; Swift's Ev. 124; Pothier, by Evans, vol. 2, p. 293;
Anth. N. P. 176, and note a; Str. 500.
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