E. A. MARCUS JONES, Appellant, v. REPUBLIC OF LIBERIA, Appellee.

APPEAL FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE FIRST JUDICIAL. CIRCUIT, MONTSERRADO COUNTY. Argued November 11, 12, 1959. Decided January 15, 1960. 1. 2. 3. 4. Murder is the killing of one person by another with malice aforethought. Guilt of murder may be proved by circumstantial evidence. The weight and credibility of testimony are for the jury alone to decide. Where wilful violation of a traffic law by the driver of a motor vehicle causes the death of a pedestrian, malice will be presumed. 5. A hit-and-run driver will be presumed to have acted with malice. An appeal from a judgment of conviction upon a verdict of guilty of murder, judgment affirmed. J. C. N. Howard for appellant. Assistant Attorneys General J. Dossen Richards and Francis Gardener for appellee. MR. JUSTICE PIERRE delivered the opinion of the Court. Charged with the unlawful, wilful, wrongful, felonious and premeditated killing with malice aforethought of Lafayette Maxim, a little boy, the appellant herein, Marcus Jones, stood trial for murder in the Circuit Court of the First Judicial Circuit, Montserrado County, at its February, 1959, term. He was arraigned upon an indictment brought by the grand jury, and entered a plea of Not Guilty thereto. An empanelled jury heard evidence, deliberated, and returned a verdict of Guilty, upon which verdict judgment was rendered ; and it is from this judgment that the appellant has come to this Court of last resort for review. The circumstances surrounding the killing would seem to be that, early in the night of January 3o, 1958, at Bushrod Island in the Commonwealth District of Monrovia, 624 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS appellant, on his return to Monrovia from Brewerville where he had gone earlier in the evening, drove a black sedan car, which he operated as a taxicab. Somewhere between Tubman Bridge and the dock area of Bushrod Island, the car driven by the appellant is alleged to have run off the left side of the road and hit one of two children drawing water at a public pump. The indictment alleges that the car was being driven with excessive speed and without due care and consideration for the life and safety of pedestrians. The child so hit is alleged to have been carried a considerable distance from the spot of impact and left dead with his body mangled on the road. The car did not stop, nor did the driver seek to ascertain what damage or harm might have been done by the impact his vehicle must have received. It would seem to us, and the traffic statutes so provide, that a driver hitting a human being should stop and render what assistance might be necessary under the circumstances; but this car continued on its way in the direction of the dock area. The sound of the impact and cries from eyewitnesses brought Inspector Mensah of the National Police Force, who was in a house a few yards away, to the scene. The Inspector’s story is as follows : “It was in the month of January, in the night between the hour of seven and eight, when I was in the neighborhood of Colonel Thompson’s house on Bushrod Island, in a place known as Logantown near the motor road. I was in a house near the road, where they have a water pump, when I heard the noise of a car as though it hit something. I immediately ran out of the house and saw a little girl standing by the water pump. She was shouting that a black taxi had hit her brother and carried him away. I had my vehicle parked in the yard, and asked the girl : ‘Where did the car go?’ She said : ‘Toward Monrovia.’ I then stopped the traffic ; and in stopping the traffic, the reflection of the light of a car that I stopped made it possible for me to LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 625 see the child lying on the road. I then rushed to him and observed that the child was dead. I started in that direction to chase the vehicle. When I am arrived at the dock area, I saw the black taxi parked under the street light. I stopped in front of the car, and saw a gentleman standing in front of the car wiping something from the hood. I then discovered that it was Mr. Marcus Jones, the defendant. I asked him : `What are you doing here when you have killed somebody?’ Mr. Jones said, ‘No, I did not kill anybody, but I am just trying to fix my hood ; it is giving me trouble.’ I started to examine the car, because when I went to the child, his pants was torn in the seat and he had excreted all on himself. And I also observed that the beam of the car that struck the child was broken, and parts of the glass were on the ground. While examining the black taxi Mr. Jones was driving, it had only one light, and part of the broken sealbeam was still hanging in the light. I asked him : `Where are you coming from?’ He said : ‘Brewerville.’ I asked him if it was possible to travel from Brewerville with a broken sealbeam. I also found out that the left front fender was also mashed in. The engine of the car was still beating. I went in to see whether the car had brakes. Then Mr. Jones said to me : ‘The car cannot move unless you cut the wheel to the right.’ I found out that the car had brakes, but it did not have a switch, and the wires were tied together with a paper clip wire. I asked Mr. Jones how it was possible for him to drive from Brewerville when his car could not cut to the right. I observed on the hood of the car that there were some blood smears that Mr. Jones was trying to wipe off when I got there. I then told Mr. Jones that he was under arrest. I took Mr. Jones with me in the jeep to the police station. I asked Mr. Jones how he happened to have had an accident which resulted in the death of a child and did not 626 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS even stop. He said to me : ‘I hit the child, but I was afraid.’ I got to the Police Headquarters and reported the matter, and took more police officers and went to the scene. We then inspected the area to see how it was possible for Mr. Jones to have made such an accident. We discovered that Mr. Jones was coming from the direction of Brewerville when he drove off to his left, off the coal-tarred road running near the water standpipe where Maxim and his sister were standing, drawing water. When the car struck the child, he went up and fell on the hood of the car. One of his middle fingers scraped on a portion of the car’s hood … was cut and left blood on the car. The car ran with the child on the hood approximately a hundred feet, cutting back to the right to get on the road. The child fell off the car. “I took Mr. Jones and the child to the Government Hospital, and asked the doctor to examine the child. He did and said that the child was dead ; to which he gave a medical certificate. When we got out of the hospital, Mr. Jones was quite nervous ; he wrote about two or three notes, and then tore them up. I asked the doctor to also examine Mr. Jones, and the doctor gave a certificate for Mr. Jones also. When I asked Mr. Jones for his driver’s license, he said he had no license. I wanted to know how it was possible for him to drive without a license; he said that his license got lost in 1957, and since that time he had no other license. I took Mr. Jones to Police Headquarters to have a charge made out.” The testimony of Police Officer Fred Johnson is to the effect, that on the night in question he got a telephone call from the Traffic Bureau, telling him that there had been an accident on the Bushrod Island Road. He continued : “When I arrived on the scene of the accident, I saw the body of the dead boy; I did not see the vehicle on the scene of the accident. While searching for the vehicle, I saw a black Opel taxicab just before the LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 627 Freeport Gate. The identification mark was : ‘De Luxe Taxi.’ I asked for the owner of the taxi, because the hood was bent in, and the mudguard also. One Marcus Jones up and said that he was the owner of the taxi. I asked him what was wrong with the taxi. I asked him because one of his headlights was broken, and on the scene of the accident there was also a broken piece of headlight. A piece of cloth was also on the hood, similar to what the dead child had on. The defendant told me that he was coming from around Tubman Bridge, and that he had slidden off the road ; and I asked him to kindly go and show me the spot where he met with such a sliding; and he refused. He was taken to the Traffic Bureau by me, and he was charged upon the complaint of Inspector Mensah.” Telow, the girl at the pump with little Lafayette Maxim when he met his death, also took the stand and testified. In her statement in chief she said : “Lafayette Maxim and I went to the pump for water. Defendant Jones’s car was coming from the direction of Brewerville. The car left the side of the road where it was driving, went to the other side, and killed Lafayette Maxim. When I looked back, I did not see Lafayette; then I hollered, calling people to the scene, saying that Lafayette and I came to the pump for water, and now I do not see him, a car has killed him. When the car went, Inspector Mensah pursued it and arrested defendant and the car. Inspector Mensah asked me : ‘Who killed Lafayette?’ I replied : ‘Defendant Marcus Jones.’ This is all I know.” Another person on the scene of the crime,. one David Clinton, testified as follows “Q. What is your name and where do you live? “A. I am David Clinton, Hying in Bushrod Island, Monrovia. “Q. Say, if you can, whether or not you are acquainted with E. A. Marcus Jones, the defendant in this case? . 628 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS “A. Yes, I am acquainted with him ; he is here now. “Q. The Government of Liberia charged the defendant with having murdered Lafayette Maxim, the decedent. You have been brought as a witness for the prosecution. Please state, if you can, briefly all facts and surrounding circumstances which may be within your certain knowledge touching said cause. “A. It was one night I went in the latrine in the Liberian Mining Company’s yard at Dock Road. In crossing the road I saw a little girl at the pump, and decedent was on the road. On my way coming I saw a black car coming from Brewerville side. The car struck the boy with such a speed, that it lifted him from the ground and carried him many feet ahead on the hood. When the hood of the car flew open it threw the body on the side of the road. Then I ran to Ma Jevoh’s place near the pump on the road, and I said to them : ‘0 my people, one man has been killed.’ I told her that I did not see any policeman on the road. Then she said to me : ‘Inspector Mensah is here.’ Then Inspector Mensah came outside and asked me if I knew the number of the car. I told him no, for I do not know book. Then Inspector Mensah came outside and pursued the defendant;, thereafter I heard that he had apprehended him. This is what I know.” Inspector Mensah testified that, after he had arrested the appellant, and whilst taking him to the police station in a jeep, he asked him why he did not stop after hitting someone, and that the appellant admitted hitting the child and fleeing because he was afraid. There were no witnesses to this conversation, and the appellant has denied ever having made such a confession. Nowhere else in the records sent up to us, has it been shown that any mention was made of a confession by appellant that he had been LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 629 in an accident at all that evening. In fact, he has categorically denied having hit anyone or anything. We think it only right, therefore, to give him the benefit of the doubt; and we have therefore disregarded Inspector Mensah’s testimony concerning such a confession. Inspector Mensah also testified that the murder car left wet tire marks on the tarred road as it swerved from the vicinity of the public pump where it had hit and picked up the child and that the print of these tire marks corresponded to the pattern of the tires on appellant’s car that night. Appellant has countered that his car could not have been the only car on the road that night using this stamp of tires. We have taken this to mean that, whilst he is prepared to agree that his car did use this stamp of tires, the fact was not sufficient to identify his car as the murder car, since other vehicles were using the same tires. We quite agree that this contention is logically reasonable and fair, and we have therefore given him the benefit of his contention. But in doing so, we cannot overlook the fact that, at the scene where the impact took place, according to the records, glass from the broken headlight of a car was found scattered in the road, and the appellant’s car in the vicinity was found to have a newly broken sealbeam light. The pump where the impact took place is on the left side of the road coming from Brewerville; the left headlight on appellant’s car was smashed, and coming from Brewerville as he was, puts this broken headlight on the pump side of the road. Quite a coincidence! But to continue. Explaining this broken headlight, the appellant testified that a girl-friend of his, one Miss Otelle Vampelt, smashed this light the night before in Bensonville whilst he was teaching her to drive his car. He did not explain, however, how broken glass from the headlight of a car happened to be found where his car had stopped on the road near the spot of the killing, nor how a part of the broken sealbeam of the left light of his car happened to 630 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS have been hanging from the smashed assembly as Inspector Mensah testified. If this part of Inspector Mensah’s testimony is true (he was never cross-examined on it, and it has not been rebutted) then it cannot be true that the appellant’s car carried two working headlights when it was taken into custody by the police as he tried to show in his statement. But if the accident responsible for his broken headlight took place in Bensonville the night before, as he said, what caused the glass from a broken headlight to be scattered before his car at the scene of the killing, more than twenty miles away from Bensonville, and more than twenty-four hours later? We have wondered whether there might not have been two accidents to this car within those twenty-four hours; one in Bensonville, and the other at the pump on Bushrod Island in Monrovia. We have also wondered why an experienced driver, as the appellant claimed to be, would have broken a sealbeam light on his taxicab the night before and, without any repairs to it, felt safe to drive the said cab as a common carrier contrary to traffic regulations. This seems to indicate very little regard for traffic rules. The appellant himself testified to not owning a driver’s license at the time of his arrest. “It shall be unlawful for any person to operate a motor vehicle within the Republic of Liberia without first obtaining a driver’s license. . . .” 1956 Code, tit. 37, � 41. “Every motor vehicle shall be equipped with two white lights in front of sufficient power to be visible not less than three hundred feet in the direction the vehicle is moving and one red light in the rear visible an equal distance in the opposite direction, except that motor cycles need have one white light in front. “The lights prescribed in this section shall be displayed at night between sunset and sunrise and at such other times as bad weather and decreased visibility may require.” 1956 Code, tit.37, � 62. LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 631 Coming now to that part of the State’s evidence relating to a portion of the garment decedent was wearing at the time of his death being found on appellant’s car, we would like to remark that it is strange that no attempt was made, on cross examination or otherwise, to test the credibility of such incriminating testimony, or to have some witness endeavor to rebut it. But on this point it is equally strange that, throughout the trial, no explanation was offered to account for the smashed condition of the left fender of appellant’s car at the time of his arrest, especially in face of his categorical denial of having hit anything, or of having been in an accident that night. Inspectors Mensah and Bestman testified that the front left fender of the appellant’s car was so smashed that it became locked against the front wheel of the car, which made moving it impossible before the dent in the fender had been beaten out. Inspector Mensah testified that, just before the arrest, the appellant told him that the car could not move unless the steering wheel was cut to the right; and since this part of the testimony was not denied or rebutted, we assume that the appellant thereby admitted major defects to his car, which prevented its normal movement. We have wondered why, since he denied having been in an accident, or having hit anything that night, he did not seek to explain what had happened between the time he left Brewerville and the moment when it became impossible for the vehicle to move beyond where it was found by the police. Then there is the testimony that, when the child was found mangled and dead on the road, he had excreted on himself, and that the examination of the car also revealed human feces and blood on its hood. This testimony was denied by the appellant; but more than one witness testified to its correctness, so we have no explanation as to how this human waste and blood could have gotten on to the appellant’s car, which had been in his possession continually, and which said vehicle had hit nobody; nor, accord- 632 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS ing to the appellant’s story, had it been in an accident that night. Appellant has contended that the State did not identify the blood on his car as human blood ; but appellant made no effort even to suggest what other kind of blood it might have been, or how human feces came to be on his car. Thus stands the evidence upon which the State rested its case ; let us now look at the story told on the stand by the appellant himself, as to his conduct on that day, and his version of the circumstances surrounding the incident of his arrest. His story is as follows : “On Wednesday evening, January 29, 1958, I had the occasion to visit a friend of mine at Bensonville in the person of Miss Otellee Vampelt. While there, we went on a car drive as far as Careysburg. On our way back to Bensonville, she requested me to let her drive the balance of the way home. When we got to the boundary dividing Careysburg and Bensonville, I stopped my car and we exchanged positions. She got in the driver’s seat and I sat beside her, and she drove from that point up to her house. On entering her yard while driving and turning in on her left, she mistakenly hit the car against an orange tree planted at the entrance of her yard, and damaged the left fender, and broke the left sealbeam, but the bulb was not broken. I thereupon came down and removed the car for her. I then left for Monrovia that very night, with the same car. On Thursday morning I attempted to get that damage repaired but I was told that it would take more than a day. As I had to use the car that very Thursday evening to go to Brewerville to join the Household of Ruth, I did not leave the car with the mechanic. “About five o’clock that evening I set out for the Methodist Girls’ Hostel at Sinkor to put up one of the Y.M.C.A. delegates from Freetown, Mr. Hedd Wilson by name, who was also going to join the Household of Ruth. When I got there he had left, so I proceeded LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 633 direct to him. When I arrived at Brewerville he was not there, and I immediately left to come back to Monrovia in search of him. On my way coming to Monrovia, the hood of my car flew open just around the road leading to L.M.C., formerly called Point Four. I stopped and closed it. I then proceeded and made a stop at M. C. Robert’s Store at Logantown, and bought me a pack of cigarettes; from there I proceeded for Monrovia. When I got between L.M.C. gate and Freeport, just opposite the German Woodwork Factory, the hood of my car flew open the second time. I then stopped to fix it; and another taxi coming from behind me stopped alongside me; and the driver came out of the taxi to assist me in fixing the hood ; but I do not know the driver’s name. I decided to find a wire or some string to tie it down, because I discovered that the bolt that locks the hood had dropped, and the clip was deformed. I went to the edge of the road and succeeded in finding a piece of wire : then I returned to the car. I started it, and put on the light, and I proceeded to tie the hood to the facing. During that time, Mr. Mensah drove up and asked me what I was doing. I told him that my hood had been giving me trouble and I was trying to tie it down. Then he told me that I had had an accident; I told him no. He said : ‘Yes, and you have killed a child.’ I told him I did not have an accident, and I did not strike anything. Then he asked me what was wrong with my headlight. I told him it got damaged the previous night. Then hesaid : ‘Consider yourself under arrest.’ I thought he was joking. I said to him : ‘Man, don’t waste your time.’ He said : ‘I am not joking. Get into my car. You are under arrest, and I will take you to the Police Station.’ At that time a passenger pickup drove up, but I don’t know who it was. I asked Inspector Mensah to let me go and see the child that he alleged I had killed. He 634 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS said : ‘No, we are going to the station.’ So I got in his jeep wagon and we drove up to police headquarters on Ashmun Street. When we arrived, Inspector Mensah, without leaving his jeep wagon, shouted upstairs that there was an accident on the Dock Road, and that they should send some police officers and the photographer. About five policemen and the policewoman came downstairs and joined Inspector Mensah and myself, and went on the Dock Road almost near Logantown, where a child supposed to be dead was lying on the ground. Among the group of police officers who went were Mrs. Toolu McKeever, Police Officer Fred Johnson, one Kojo, a photographer, and two others. When we reached the scene, Inspector Mensah said to me : ‘Here is the child that you have killed.’ I said : ‘No, I was not the one who killed that child, because when I passed that area the road was cleared. There were vehicles ahead of me as well as behind me, and I did not hit anything, and that child was not on the road.’ He then sent me and another police officer to where he parked his jeep wagon. I stayed there in the custody of the policeman until they finished looking around, and we carried the child to the hospital.” According to appellant’s testimony, when he passed the spot where the child was hit, he saw nothing on the road ; we understand by this statement that the killing must have taken place after he had passed the spot. But he also testified that the only vehicle that passed him after he stopped, was the taxi which stopped for its driver to help him fix his hood, “a Morris car without a license plate” ; and that it was whilst he and this taxi driver were fixing the hood that Inspector Mensah came and arrested him; so that according to him, the only vehicle which could have killed the child was the taxi, this Morris car which came behind him and stopped to assist him with his hood. It is strange, therefore, that this Morris car did not show LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 635 the physical indications of an accident, such as appeared on the appellant’s car. For instance, this Morris taxi was able to continue its journey to Monrovia without difficulty, whereas appellant’s car which had not been in an accident that night, had a smashed headlight, and a left fender so bent that it impaired the revolution of the left front wheel. And also since, when he passed the spot where the child was hit, his car was capable of normal movement, these damages must have happened to his vehicle between where the child was hit and where he stopped to fix his hood. If we must accept what he says as true, then we are faced with an anomaly beyond physical possibility. During the argument before this Court we inquired of the appellant’s counsel whether he seriously insisted upon defending the plea of Not Guilty, in face of the circumstances appearing in the testimony of the witnesses on both sides in the case. We asked the question because we could not understand how the appellant could expect to sustain a positive plea of Not Guilty in the face of his own testimony and of the physical condition of his car as related to the circumstances surrounding the killing and the scene of the killing. Witness Aaron Cooper, who testified for the appellant, sought to paint a picture entirely different from those presented by both sides. His evidence, therefore, appears very ridiculous. For instance, he testified that, as he was returning from Brewerville that evening in a pickup, he stopped at Logantown, just as the appellant had done. Whilst there, four or five cars passed him on their way to Monrovia ; and among them was Mr. Jones’s car. Asked whether he had known the car before, he said that he was seeing it for the first time that night after the killing. How then did he know it was among the cars that passed him? This question was not answered. He was of the opinion that Jones’s car could not have killed the boy because it was not heavy enough to crush the child’s chest as 636 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS it rolled over him. This is the only witness who testified to a car rolling over the child, and he admits that he wasn’t even present when it happened. He is also the only witness who testified to the child’s chest being crushed ; and he admits that he did not examine the body. Here is his examination on the point. “Q. You have stated that a heavier vehicle than the one of Mr. Jones killed decedent Lafayette Maxim. When you arrived on the scene where you met poor Lafayette Maxim, was his body seriously mutilated? “A. The body was not bruised on the face, but a vehicle had rolled over the chest, and the chest was mashed up. And after a look at the chest I came to the conclusion that the mashed chest could only have been caused by a heavier vehicle than that of Mr. Jones. “Q. Are you a physician, and if you are, did you examine the body of decedent? “A. I am not a physician, but everybody knows that the track of a heavy vehicle would leave a heavier tread than a light one. So anyone can easily tell when an object is mashed down by heavier equipment than a lighter one. “Q. The doctor who examined him did not say his chest was crushed or broken ; are you saying it? “A. I did not pass an autopsy on the body of decedent; but, as far as I could see the body was mashed on the chest. We have wondered why all this conjecturing was volunteered by witness Cooper. There is nothing that can be more detrimental to the defense in a criminal case than the testimony of a witness who, in his overzealousness, introduces threads of falsehood or inconsistencies, in an effort to paint a beautiful picture, only to produce, instead, one of varied and clashing colors. The result, in such cases, is always the same : the story fits none of the circumstances in the case. Here is a witness whose testimony shows him LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 637 to have been conspicuously present at the scene of the accident when Inspector Mensah arrived and when the arrest was made ; so conspicuous indeed, according to him, that after he and the Inspector had arrived, he is supposed to have offered to lend assistance to the police. No other witness saw him; not even the appellant himself. According to his story, after they arrived on the scene and met the boy dead on the road : “The first car we saw was that of Mr. Jones : a small car. So I personally was not going to attack the driver of that particular car owned by Mr. Jones ; it could not have caused the instant death of a boy that size. It appeared to me that the car that hit the boy was a car of a considerable weight. And therefore I wanted to stop the first car at the red light, in order for us to line them up and investigate. In an effort so to do, Inspector Mensah did not cooperate with me, hence I could not line them up to investigate.” What could have been Mr. Cooper’s reason for wanting to line up cars travelling towards Monrovia from B rewerville after the boy had been dead for some time? Certainly Mr. Cooper could not have intended to apprehend the culprit. It seems reasonably clear that the car which hit the boy had already passed before Mr. Cooper arrived. But what was the source of Mr. Cooper’s unsolicited interest, with the police on the spot controlling the investigation? Mr. Cooper not only acted strangely in this regard, but he is the only person who testified for either side to have mentioned his presence at the scene. The appellant, in his own testimony, named only one other person present when the Inspector arrived, and that was a taxi driver whose name he did not know. None of the several police officers who took the stand made any mention of Mr. Cooper, although he has made himself so conspicuous at the scene. The words of Mr. Cooper’s testimony fail to fit the tunes sung by other witnesses in this case. Miss Otellee Vampelt and Mr. Robert Bright also 638 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS testified ; but, since their testimony had no bearing on what happened at the scene of the killing, we do not deem it material to the determination of this case. The enormity or triviality of a crime does not in any manner control conclusions to be reached in appellate review of the records certified from the court below. The positions of both sides, as they are established by the evidence of the trial appearing in the records, must be weighed against each other, and a determination reached upon that criterion only. It matters not whether the crime be a misdemeanor or a felony. So the fact that human life is involved is not a controlling factor in a murder case on appeal; the appellate court watches to satisfy itself that the evidence was conclusive, that the trial was regular, and that the defendant was afforded every right guaranteed to him under the law. Beyond that point this Court cannot legally go. We have reviewed the testimony of the State’s witnesses; we have also examined the statement of the appellant as to his movements that evening and the circumstances surrounding his arrest. We have very carefully looked at the physical evidence found at the scene of the killing and on the appellant’s car ; and we have no difficulty in reaching the conclusion that the evidence of the prosecution is conclusive. Let us see now whether or not the trial was regular, fair and impartial. The appellant’s bill of exceptions contains eleven counts. Count “i” excepts to the court having sustained an objection to a question relating to the probability of other cars on the same road on the night of the killing using the same brand and stamp of tires. We are of the opinion that this question was proper, and should have been allowed, since it hinged upon identification of the murder car. But the question of whether other cars used the same tires that night has to be looked at together with a number of peculiar circumstances relating to the appellant’s car. Was another car with similar tires in the vicinity at that time, with a broken headlight, a mashed LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 639 fender which rendered it immovable and with human blood and waste upon it, such as was found on the dead child, and with a portion of his torn garment upon it? If it could be claimed that any other car with these tires had also carried these identical indications that an accident had occurred, and had been among the cars which the police stopped after the killing, we would be willing to concede the merit of this count. Remember, witnesses testified that the police stopped all cars after the killing; and appellant, himself, testified that the only other car which passed him, after he passed the spot of the killing, was the little Morris taxicab. Count “4” of the bill of exceptions excepts to the trial Judge’s having overruled objections to the admission of photographs taken of decedent’s body at the scene and to the admission of the charge sheet upon which the appellant was booked at the police station. We cannot see how these pieces of evidence could adversely affect the fairness of the trial. “When a person is charged with a felonious homicide the jury should be given by the evidence as complete a picture as possible of all the surrounding circumstances.” Mason v. Republic, [1934] LRSC 9; 4 L.L.R. 81 (1934), Syllabus “8.” And also, Mr. Justice Russell said in the case Yancy v. Republic: “In criminal cases a picture of all the surrounding circumstances should by the evidence be put before the jury.” Yancy v. Republic, [1935] LRSC 7; 4 L.L.R. 268 (1935), Syllabus “1.” Count “6” of the bill of exceptions alleges that the trial Judge neglected to charge the jury on conflicting statements in the testimony of the State’s witnesses, as well as on the following points of law: murder, reasonable doubt, criminal agency, circumstantial evidence and uncertain evidence. For the benefit of this opinion we will quote the Judge’s charge. It reads, word for word, as follows : “This is a case of murder in which the Republic of 640 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS Liberia has charged one E. A. Marcus Jones with the killing of one Lafayette Maxim on January 3o, 1958. At the call of the case, defendant Jones was arraigned, and the indictment was read to him. When he pleaded Not Guilty to the charge, you were selected, sworn and empanelled to try the issue thus joined between plaintiff and defendant. It is expected of you, therefore, that this solemn duty of yours will be performed without prejudice, malice or hate. Before going further, I would like to explain to you the word, murder. Of course, when we use this word, we refer to a crime which affects the person. It is the killing of any human being by another without legal justification or excuse, and with malice aforethought. Now, when we use the words malice aforethought, in law, this does not necessarily mean hate, ill will or malevolence, but an unlawful act wilfully done without just excuse or legal occasion to the injury of another person. “You are the triers of the facts, upon whom is cast the responsibility of determining or passing upon the credibility of the evidence in the case. Inspector Mensah of the Police Department testified to the fact that, on the night of January 3o, 1958, whilst in the neighborhood of Commissioner Thompson’s house, he heard a noise and rushed on to the scene and saw a little girl standing near the pump, crying, and she told him that a black taxi had knocked her brother down and killed him. He said, further, that the taxi referred to was a black taxi as referred to by the little girl. Mr. Mensah said, further, that he saw the child, Lafayette Maxim, lying dead not far from the pump ; he then took his jeep and, in an effort to apprehend the perpetrator, started chasing the said taxi. He said also that, when he got as far as the Free Port of Monrovia, he met a black taxi parked with defendant Jones standing in front of it. This witness also told you that the said taxi could not move because the fender had LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 641 been damaged. And also, from the circumstances attending the cause, he arrested defendant Jones and took him to Police Headquarters for investigation. As a result of said investigation, defendant Jones was held on a charge of murder, to be dealt with in keeping with law. “The next witness was the little girl, Telow, who was at the pump with Lafayette Maxim when the tragic happening took place. You, as judges of the facts, heard all that was said by her, as well as all of the other witnesses for the prosecution. You saw the photo of the deceased, and know well that the said Lafayette Maxim is dead, and that his death resulted from being knocked down by a taxi. This part of the corpus delicti has been well established. Now, let us see if the second part has also been established, either by positive, circumstantial or presumptive evidence. Truly, there was no one at the pump except the little girl, Telow, and Lafayette Maxim, when the latter got knocked down and killed, as given in evidence ; and it goes without saying that we do not have a scintilla of evidence upon record tending to establish defendant’s guilt by positive or direct evidence. Moreover, since such crimes as murder and the like are seldom committed before the public, but rather in secrecy, the law provides two other ways of arriving at a just conclusion of defendant’s guilt–one, by circumstantial evidence; two, by presumptive evidence. However, before expatiating upon this quality of evidence, let us for a moment review the evidence of the defendant with a view of finding out whether he has in any way negatived the presumption of guilt. “Defendant Jones, while on the stand as a witness, told you that the hood of his car was giving him some trouble, and that he only stopped at the Free Port to fix it. He also told you that a driver who was in another cab, assisted him in fixing said hood. But 642 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS did he identify this driver or even the cab? You also heard the testimony of all of his witnesses ; and as triers of the facts, you will be able to say whether they have given anything in evidence tending to show that the defendant Jones, is absolved from complicity in the death of Lafayette Maxim. His own witness, Mr. Bright, said, whilst on the stand, that although defendant Jones protested against their giving $so to the relatives of the deceased to assist in the burial, yet when it was explained to him that such a method would serve to pacify conditions, defendant Jones and he laughed over the matter. What could have motivated such acquiescence on part of defendant Jones, if he knew well that the allegation was unfounded? As judges of the facts, you also heard what the witnesses for the prosecution said in rebutting a portion of defendant’s own statement. “Therefore, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this court cannot invade your province ; this court can only charge you upon the law controlling the evidence adduced at the trial. If you feel that the prosecution has failed to establish the guilt of the defendant, by circumstantial or presumptive evidence, it is within your province so to determine; but on the other hand, if you have an abiding conviction that defendant did kill Lafayette Maxim, in keeping with the evidence adduced at the trial, it is also within your province to determine. Where there is a doubt in a criminal trial, such doubt must necessarily operate in favor of the defendant. But on the other hand, where the evidence is clear and cogent, so as to exclude every hypothesis of doubt, then there should be no doubt logically. Moreover, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you are the judges of the facts. I charge you, therefore, to retire to your room of deliberation, and return a verdict in keeping with the evidence adduced at this trial.” LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 643 As far as we have read and are able to understand the Judge’s charge, it was quite in harmony with what both sides could have expected of a fair judge. We have not been able to discover any unfairness in the charge. On the points of conflict of evidence, and of uncertainty of evidence on part of the State, we feel that the trial Judge did not err in failing to instruct the jury either that there was indeed conflict in the testimony, or that the State’s evidence was uncertain. Whilst admission of evidence is the right of the court, what weight, credibility and effect the evidence should have is with the jury. No Judge may invade this province without infringing the legal rights of those selected and sworn to try the facts. We do not agree with the contention raised in Count “7” of the bill that the charge of the Judge inflamed the minds of the jury. Coming, now, to the question of proving the corpus delicti, as raised in Count “1o” of the bill of exceptions, appellant contends that the State failed to produce the certificate of death alleged to have been issued by the doctor at the hospital, or to ascertain with certainty that the blood on the car was indeed that of the decedent, or to conduct a thorough examination to establish the fact that the material found on the car was indeed a part of the garment worn by the decedent and found on his body at the scene. Not having done these things, the State could not claim to have proved the corpus delicti with certainty, or to have connected the defendant therewith. The fact of Lafayette Maxim’s death has been proved so conclusively from the evidence found in the records that there should be no further doubt of this fact. The indictment has charged that the decedent met his death by a blow struck by a moving vehicle which knocked him down at the pump. Appellant himself, with police officers, viewed the body at the scene of the killing, and subsequently accompanied it to the hospital. This was the appellant’s own testimony; nowhere in the records has he 644 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS denied these facts. At no time did the defendant show, either in his own direct testimony, or on cross examination, or through the testimony of other witnesses, that the blood on his car was that of some animal other than a human being, or that it was the blood of some person other than the decedent. The appellant himself testified, and did not deny, that the body found at the scene was that of Lafayette Maxim who had been killed by a moving vehicle as alleged in the indictment. Physical traces found on the car appellant admits to be his, and which he was driving that night, as mentioned before in this opinion, have, in our view, forged a strong and unbroken chain of circumstantial evidence against the appellant. This Court has held that: “Circumstantial evidence is that species of evidence which tends to prove a disputed fact by proof of other facts which have a legitimate tendency, from the laws of nature, the usual connection of things and the ordinary transaction of business, etc., to lead the mind to a conclusion that the facts exist which are sought to be established.” Ledlow v. Republic, [1925] LRSC 12; 2 L.L.R. 569 (1926), Syllabus “6.” Count “1 t” of the bill of exceptions reads word for word as follows : “And also because defendant avers that Your Honor could not have entered final judgment on the verdict, premised upon the facts adduced during the trial ; for the prosecution did not prove the existence of circumstances evidencing an abandoned and malignant heart on the part of the defendant during the perpetration of the alleged homicide, submitting to the non-existence of express malice in law.” This is a peculiar count in the bill of exceptions, in view of the positive plea of Not Guilty entered. However, the question of absence of malice was strongly urged and very heatedly argued by appellant’s counsel at this bar. The appellant contends that he could have had no ill will or LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS 645 evil intention toward the decedent, whom he did not even know. He insisted, in his brief, that no witness had gone to the stand and testified to this fact. Appellees, on the other hand, have argued that it was not necessary to prove previous acquaintance between the defendant and decedent, or to prove that there had been any altercation before the impact that caused decedent’s death. We find ourselves in agreement with this latter contention. Judge Bouvier has defined malice as follows : “The doing of a wrongful act intentionally without just cause or excuse. A wicked and mischievous purpose which characterizes the perpetration of an injurious act without lawful excuse. A conscious violation of the law, to the prejudice of another. . . . “Any formed design of mischief may be called malice. Malice is a wicked, vindictive temper, regardless of social duty, and bent on mischief. There may be malice, in a logical sense, in homicide, where there is no actual intention of any mischief, but the killing is the natural consequence of a careless action. . . . “Express malice exists when the party evinces an intention to commit the crime. “Implied malice is that inferred by law from the facts proved. . . . In cases of murder this distinction is of no practical value.” BOUVIER, LAW DICTIONARY 2067 Malice (Rawle’s 3rd rev. 1914). We have also relied upon the following authorities in reaching a decision on this point: Kelleng V. Republic, [1934] LRSC 4; 4 L.L.R. 33 (1934). Darnenoh v. Republic, [1935] LRSC 12; 4 L.L.R. 308 (1935). 13 R.C.L. 741-43 Homicide �� 46-47. 18 R.C.L. 2-4 Malice �� 2-3. 2 WHARTON, CRIMINAL EVIDENCE 1515, � 764 loth ed. 1912). 34 AM. JUR. 683 Malice � 3. 25 CYC. 1666-69 Malice. In view of the foregoing authorities it should be clear 646 LIBERIAN LAW REPORTS that malice, in cases of murder, need not proceed from previous antipathy, ill will or misunderstanding; not even though it could be shown that the defendant had never met the decedent before. Where wilful violation of a traffic statute results in the death of a pedestrian, and where the defendant in such a case enters an unqualified plea of Not Guilty, a strong presumption of malice arises even though not predicated upon any ill will. It is also our opinion that any operator of a motor vehicle who has regard for human life and safety, upon finding that he might have hit a human being, would naturally stop and ascertain the extent of any probable injury resulting therefrom, thereby responding to humane and natural tendencies of abhorrence at the taking of human life. But a driver who, whilst violating a traffic law, also hits a human being, and, without human sympathy or consideration, flees the scene of the accident, thereby shows not only a heart regardless of social duty but also a callousness not inferior to the highest degree of malice. We have not deemed it necessary to review other counts in the bill of exceptions which either repeat the general issues or do not raise any others upon which the case could stand or fall. We have not been able to find any material errors which could be said to have affected or prejudiced the trial rights of the appellant. In our opinion the trial was fair and regular, and the verdict of the jury was in harmony with the evidence. Under the circumstances we feel that the judgment should be, and the same is hereby affirmed. Judgment affirmed.