Charlie

The information in this case charges that the defendant, on the eighteenth day of March, 1917, in the county of Modoc, committed upon the person of one West Steele an assault with a deadly weapon. The jury found the defendant guilty of the assault as so charged, and he appeals to this court from the judgment of conviction.

Both the defendant and the prosecuting witness, West Steele, are Indians. It appears that the defendant claimed an indebtedness due him from Steele in the sum of two dollars, the former claiming that the latter, prior to the date of the trouble resulting in the assault, had borrowed that amount from him. On the day of the assault, the defendant had intended going to the town of Likely, in Modoc County, but, before starting to said town, and accompanied by two or three other Indians, he called at the home of West Steele, a short distance from Alturas, for the purpose of collecting the money he claimed Steele owed him. On entering the house the defendant asked Steele for the money, whereupon the latter declared that he owed the defendant nothing. An altercation followed, resulting in a fist fight, the defendant being the aggressor in the assault, having struck…