Maconnehey v. State
Ohio Supreme Court
This is a writ of error to reverse the judgment of the Court of Common Pleas of Muskingum county, on an indictment for the crime of shooting at a person with intent to kill. On the trial in the court below, after evidence had been given on the part of the State tending to sustain the indictment, the plaintiff in error gave evidence tending to prove, that at the time he did the act charged, he was laboring under an attack of delirium tremens.
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This is a writ of error to reverse the judgment of the Court of Common Pleas of Muskingum county, on an indictment for the crime of shooting at a person with intent to kill. On the trial in the court below, after evidence had been given on the part of the State tending to sustain the indictment, the plaintiff in error gave evidence tending to prove, that at the time he did the act charged, he was laboring under an attack of delirium tremens. And after the evidence was closed, the plaintiff in error asked the court to charge the jury, that delirium tremens, although a consequence superinduced…
1Opinion of the CourtBartley, J.
While drunkenness creates no exemption from *78criminal responsibility, and may even exaggerate the turpitude of guilt in some cases, delirium tremens, although the result or consequence of continued intoxication, is insanity, or a diseased state of the mind, which affects responsibility for crime in the same way as insanity produced from any other cause.
The reason that intoxication creates no exemption from criminal responsibility, does not apply to delirium tremens, which, although like many other kinds of mania, the result of prior vicious indulgence, is always shunned rather than courted by…
2Cited by5 opinions
- State v. RobinsonWest Virginia Supreme Court · 1882
- Evers v. StateCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas · 1892
- Duke v. StateCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas · 1910
- People v. TonerMichigan Supreme Court · 1922
- Terrill v. StateWisconsin Supreme Court · 1889