Campbell v. State

1. ""After the fact of conspiracy shall be proved, the declarations by any one of the conspirators during the pendency of the criminal project shall be admissible against all."" Code, § 38-306. (a) In the instant case, the evidence shows that the defendant and four other convicts overpowered the guards at a public-work camp and took their guns, and that while the defendant was absent the other escaping convicts posted a lookout and held the guards prisoner until the defendant returned some ten to fifteen minutes later with an automobile and all of them got into it and escaped. It is further shown that the homicide occurred on a road adjacent to the work camp when the defendant stopped an automobile, shot the driver, and took his car. Grounds 1 and 2 of the amended motion for new trial assign error on the admission in evidence of that portion of the testimony of two named guards, relating to the acts and declarations of such other convicts which took place in the absence of the defendant, over the objection that it was irrelevant and prejudicial to the defendant, who alone was being tried on the charge of murder. The evidence objected to was sufficient to establish the fact of conspiracy to escape from the work camp, and while it is true that the defendant was not being tried for the escape, nevertheless, since the homicide occurred in pursuance of such conspiracy, the evidence was admissible against the defendant, not only as relating to the acts and declarations of conspirators during the pendency of a criminal project, but also as being illustrative of the defendant's motive for arming himself and for procuring the automobile in which act the homicide occurred. See, in this connection, Boone v. State, 145 Ga. 37, 39 (88 S.E. 558); Wall v. State, 126 Ga. 86 (54 S.E. 815); Wall v. State, 153 Ga. 309, 316 (112 S.E. 142). It follows, therefore, that the trial court did not err in admitting such testimony in evidence, and the above assignments of error are without merit.