Harold v. Commonwealth

The plaintiff in error, hereinafter called the accused, was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and sentenced to the penitentiary for three years. The accused did not, in any way, put his character as defendant in evidence before the jury, but while testifying in his own behalf he was asked, on cross-examination, by counsel assisting in the prosecution: “Why he was discharged from the army?” To which question the accused, by counsel, objected on the ground that same was irrelevant, immaterial and illegal, that he was not on trial for this offense, and had not come prepared to defend the same,…