Gosha v. The State Of Ga.
| Decision Date | 31 January 1876 |
| Citation | 56 Ga. 36 |
| Parties | Wesley Gosha, plaintiff in error. v. The State of Georgia, defendant in error. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
Criminal law. Rape. Infant. Venue. Before Judge Clark. Sumter Superior Court. October Term, 1875.
Reported in the opinion.
Allen Fort; J. R. McCleskey, for plaintiff in error.
C. F. Crisp, solicitor general, for the state.
The defendant was indicted and found guilty of rape. He moved for a new trial, and error is assigned here on two grounds: first, that the court erred in charging that a female child under ten years of age could not consent to sexual intercourse, so as to show that the act was not done forcibly or against her will, there being some proof of her consent; and secondly, because the venue was not sufficiently proven; and these are the two questions the record before us makes.
1. As to the first question, the rule at common law is well established, and we think founded in wisdom: See 4 Black-stone, (Cooley) 210, 212. It has also, in effect, received the sanction of this court: Stephens v. The State, 11 Georgia Re-ports, 238. We shall not disturb it. That rule is. that her tender years concludes the question—she cannot consent.
2. In respect to the second point, we think that it does not appear affirmatively, with sufficient certainty, that the the crime *was committed in the county of Sumter. There is no positive proof in the record of the precise locus—the place where it occurred. It was within fifty yards of a residence, and that residence was within the county of Sumter; but there is no proof whether on the line。 or near the line, or in the center, or in what part of the county that residence was. It might have been within twenty yards of the line. We are constrained, therefore, to grant a new trial in this case on this ground, and do so the more readily because we think that the court below was rather severe in the penalty inflicted, twenty years in the penitentiary. The defendant was only some sixteen years old; the girl probably did consent: and while the law renders that no justification, as she was under ten, yet, perhaps, it should so mitigate the crime as to make the punishment lighter. At all events, we give him another opportunity of being heard before the jury and of appeal to the tender mercies of the court below. The parties all belong to the colored population of our state, who, owing to their ignorance, as a general rule, should have justice...
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Worthen v. State
...and thus to the fact that it was actually overruling sub silentio the position on which our Court had settled in the 1930s.6 In Gosha v. State, 56 Ga. 36 (1876), the Court held that venue was not sufficiently proved by evidence that the rape occurred within 50 yards of a residence located i......
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Rouse v. State
...it is recognized that venue is not a substantive element of crimes. The Georgia rule traces back to this Court's decision in Gosha v. State, 56 Ga. 36 (1876), which held that “[t]he venue of a crime must be established clearly and beyond all reasonable doubt[.]” Id. at 36 n. 2. But Gosha di......
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State v. Siepert
... ... Reversed and remanded ... Reversed and remanded ... Miller ... & Ricks, for Appellants ... Venue, ... like all other issuable facts in criminal cases, must be ... proved beyond a reasonable doubt. (Davis v. State, ... 134 Wis. 632, 115 N.W. 150; Gosha v. State, 56 Ga ... 36; Green v. State, 4 Ga.App. 260, 61 S.E. 234; ... Jones v. State, 113 Ga. 271, 38 S.E. 851; Murphy ... v. State, 121 Ga. 142, 48 S.E. 909; Cooper v ... State, 2 Ga.App. 730, 59 S.E. 20; Commonwealth v ... Costley, 118 Mass. 1; State v. Keeland, 39 ... Mont. 506, 104 ... ...
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Cooper v. State, 71755
...intercourse, so as to rebut the presumption of force." Stephen v. State, 11 Ga. 225 (15) (1852). This view was reaffirmed in Gosha v. State, 56 Ga. 36 (1) (1876), wherein the court held: "An infant under ten years of age cannot consent to sexual intercourse, and the fact that such is her ag......