Sidwell

The defendant was charged, by information duly filed in the superior court of Lassen County, with the crime of murder, and, upon his trial on said charge, was convicted of the crime of involuntary manslaughter and thereafter sentenced by the court to serve a period of one year in the state penitentiary.

He appeals from the judgment of conviction and the order denying his motion for a new trial.

The homicide occurred at the town of Westwood, in said county of Lassen, on the fourteenth day of March, 1915.

It appears to be conceded, although we have been unable to find the facts to have been shown by the evidence, that the town of Westwood has been brought into existence within the last three years by the Red River Lumber Company, a corporation, maintaining an extensive lumber manufacturing plant there; that said company owns all the real estate within said town or upon which it stands, and that the town has a population of approximately two thousand five hundred, all of whom are employees, or members of the families of employees, of said company.

It appears from the record that the company maintains a number of boarding, lodging and bunk houses, in which many of its employees…

I concur in the judgment and the foregoing opinion, but I desire to add that, in my judgment, if the defendant had shown the facts that he sought in vain to introduce in evidence, it would have afforded no justification nor excuse for his conduct in needlessly imperiling the lives of the men in the room. The mere circumstance that gambling was being carried on was not sufficient; as I view it, to warrant the defendant in breaking down the door, with a loaded pistol in his hand. Especially would this be true when he had reason to believe that a fatal affray might ensue. His desire and that of the company to suppress gambling was, of course, commendable, but the method resorted to was too drastic. Human life is too precious to be jeopardized for the purpose of ascertaining whether parties are engaged in a peaceful game of poker. Defendant should have directed the inmates to open the door before resorting to such violence, and I think he should have gone away rather than plunge into the room with his loaded revolver in his hand. Our aversion to vice should not blind us to the more vital consideration of life itself.