Smithey v. State

Duckworth, Chief Justice.

This case involves the crime of murder. The defendant was indicted and convicted of killing her husband by shooting him with a certain pistol with malice aforethought. The accused admitted the killing to an investigating officer but added certain mitigating circumstances, and in her unsworn statement, offered further circumstances to show justification or mitigation by reason of fear of her husband who had cut her and beat her before and who had threatened to kill her. There was, however, other testimony by State’s witnesses showing that the killing was without…