Reeves v. State

OPINION

DALLY, Commissioner.

This is an appeal from a conviction for murder; the appellant’s punishment of imprisonment for forty-five years was assessed by the jury. In two grounds of error the appellant asserts that the trial court erred in failing to conduct a hearing to determine his mental competency to stand trial and in failing to charge the jury on the law of murder without malice.

On September 14, 1972, the appellant’s counsel filed a “Motion for Sanity Hearing.” Attached to that motion was a copy of a letter written on the stationery of a psychiatrist addressed to the appellant’s trial…