State v. Smith

SOMERVILLE, Judge.

Defendant, tried on a charge of murder, second degree, was found guilty by a jury of manslaughter. The trial court, in view of the jury’s inability to agree thereon, fixed defendant’s punishment at eight years confinement in Missouri Department of Corrections.

Defendant impugns the legality of his conviction by citing three rulings of the trial court as harbingers of reversible error on appeal: (1) in permitting the state, over objection of defendant that such invaded the province of the jury, to ask and elicit an affirmative answer from one of its witnesses on redirect…