Baker v. State, 34834
| Decision Date | 19 September 1953 |
| Docket Number | No. 34834,No. 2,34834,2 |
| Citation | 88 Ga.App. 894,78 S.E.2d 357 |
| Parties | BAKER v. STATE |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
Syllabus by the Court.
1. The fact that the court in charging the jury on the law as to the offense of assault with intent to murder for which the defendant was under indictment, inadvertently repeated the definition of the offense of stabbing, did not, where the charge as a whole did not constitute an unfair statement of the law in relation to the defendant's rights, constitute reversible error.
2. Under the facts of this case, the court did not commit error in giving to the jury a charge on the law of involuntary manslaughter, such definition being given in connection with definitions of voluntary manslaughter and murder and relating to an instruction to the effect that the defendant could be found guilty of assault with intent to murder only under circumstances such that, had death ensued, the crime would have been murder as distinguished from manslaughter.
Lewis & Rozier, Sparta, J. D. Godfrey, Casey Thigpen, Sandersville, for plaintiff in error.
George D. Lawrence, Sol. Gen., Eatonton, for defendant in error.
Johnny Baker was indicated and tried in the Superior Court of Hancock County for assault with intent to murder, and was convicted of the lesser offense of stabbing. The testimony of all witnesses agreed that Dixon, the prosecuting witness, and a friend, Pinkston, were returning home from a church meeting; that the defendant and another man drove by; and that, after some conversation, the defendant and Pinkston got in a dice game which ended in a quarrel as to who had won. The defendant picked up the money; Pinkston grabbed it from him and ran, or as he expressed it, 'took the rabbit's place'; Dixon and the defendant then fought--Dixon with a cane, which he broke over Baker, and Baker with a knife, with which he several times stabbed his adversary. The case for the State showed that, after Pinkston vanished from the scene, the defendant attacked Dixon with a knife, stating that he was going to 'get' him; that for the defense was to the effect that, while Pinkston and the defendant were tussling, the defendant clouted the latter with a stick, and that he then turned to defend himself, and, in so doing, inflicted the wounds on the witness' head, shoulder, and hip.
The defendant here assigns as error the overruling of the motion for a new trial on two special grounds only, relating to the charge of the court.
1. Proof of the offense of assault with intent to murder must include proof of all the elements of murder, including the intent of kill, except only the death of the victim. Under an indictment for this crime the defendant may be found guilty of the lesser offense of stabbing where the weapon used was a knife or similar object, and where there was no specific intent to kill. Davis v. State, 76 Ga.App. 860, 47 S.E.2d 670. The defendant, while conceding that the court properly charged Code, § 26-1701 relating to that offense, contends that it was error harmful to the defendant to twice charge the first sentence of this section as follows: 'Any person who shall stab another, except in his own defense or other circumstances of justification, with a sword, dirk, or knife, or other instrument of like kind, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor'.
It is error 'to repeat again and again that portion of his charge which was favorable to the plaintiff, but not that part which was...
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Jackson v. Rodriquez
...emphasis as to result in an unfair statement of the law in relation to the [complaining party's] rights. [Cits.]" Baker v. State, 88 Ga.App. 894, 895, 78 S.E.2d 357 (1953). Thus, "to determine whether the error is prejudicial so as to result in reversal, the whole charge must be examined. [......
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Lockett v. State, 56079
...there was undue emphasis so as to result in an unfair statement of the law in relation to the defendant's rights. Baker v. State, 88 Ga.App. 894(1), 895, 78 S.E.2d 357. 5. Defendant requested a charge on the lesser included offense of theft by taking. The court did charge with reference to ......
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Howard v. State
...or similar language found elsewhere in the complete charge. Compare Patterson v. State, 207 Ga. 357(2), 61 S.E.2d 462; Baker v. State, 88 Ga.App. 894, 78 S.E.2d 357. 3. An enumeration of error which is expressly abandoned need not be 4. The jury was authorized by the evidence to find that t......
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Brown v. State
...there was such undue emphasis as to result in an unfair statement of the law in relation to the defendant's rights. Baker v. State, 88 Ga.App. 894, 895, 78 S.E.2d 357. In the instant case, the reiteration was as to the lesser included offense of the crime charged in the indictment and as to......