Wilson

Defendant was charged by an information of the district attorney of the county of Santa Barbara with having on the twenty-ninth day of April, 1917, murdered Pedro Lopez. The jury by its verdict found him guilty of the crime of manslaughter and the trial judge sentenced him to serve a term of ten years in the penitentiary. Motion for a new trial was made and denied and an appeal was then taken both from the judgment and from the order denying that motion.

The killing occurred while appellant, who was at the time a deputy constable, was assisting one Knight, the constable under whom appellant was deputized, in an attempt to arrest Lopez and a man named Flores. On the day in question Lopez, in company with Flores, one Pena, and one Cordero, was in a building which was located on the main street of the little town of Santa Ynez, in the county of Santa Barbara. Lopez at least had been drinking and by all of the testimony was shown to have been considerably intoxicated. The men emerged from the building on to a vacant lot adjoining thereto. They were quarreling and fighting among themselves, one knocking the other down repeatedly. A fifth man named Espinosa made another of the party…