Chambers v. State
| Citation | 192 S.E.2d 916,127 Ga.App. 196 |
| Decision Date | 27 September 1972 |
| Docket Number | No. 47450,No. 1,47450,1 |
| Parties | John CHAMBERS v. The STATE |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
Alexander & Jarrard, R. Thomas Jarrard, Athens, for appellant.
Ken Stula, Solicitor, Athens, for appellee.
Syllabus Opinion by the Court
The defendant was convicted of the offense of obstruction of officers, Code Ann. § 26-2505 (Ga.L.1968, pp. 1249, 1313). The accusation alleged that he 'knowingly and wilfully obstructed and hindered Sgt. R. A. Lumley, a law enforcement officer, in the lawful discharge of his official duties as follows: by stricking (sic) said R. A. Lumley on the left side of head with his fist.' He appeals from the judgment of conviction and sentence. Held:
1. (Emphasis supplied.) Daniels v. State, 58 Ga.App. 599(3), 199 S.E. 572; Jordan v. State, 78 Ga.App. 879, 883, 52 S.E.2d 505. The objection here was to the prosecutor's reference, in his opening remarks to the jury, to the defendant's having discarded 'drugs' at the time of the altercation in issue. In spite of the insistence by the prosecutor and the trial judge that no reference was intended or made to illegal drugs, the jury is presumed to have been sufficiently aware of the current prevalence of illegal drugs and to have reasonably, even if erroneously, deducted that the 'drugs' were illegal drugs, rather than merely prescription drugs or medicines. This would clearly be prejudicial, as the defendant was not on trial for the possession of illegal drugs. This deduction would be reinforced by the evidence that the defendant's brother was in jail on a possession of illegal drugs charge, and by the prosecutor's use of the word 'discarded,' implying an attempt by the defendant to conceal incriminating evidence; whereas there was evidence from which the jury might find that the defendant had a bag containing medicine which he had intended to take to his brother, and which he was in the process of merely setting down (and not necessarily 'discarding') when he was approached from behind by the deputy sheriff whom he was accused of obstructing. Even if these remarks were made in good faith, the trial judge did not instruct the jury at all in order to disabuse their minds of any possible prejudice resulting from this injection of a foreign issue into the case. Therefore, the trial judge erred in overruling the defendant's motion for a mistrial, as contended in the first enumerated error.
2. Although there was evidence from which the jury could have found that the law enforcement officer had stepped aside from his official duties to satisfy a personal vengeance, there was some 'conflict in the evidence, and the evidence introduced, with all reasonable deductions and inferences therefrom,' did not 'demand a verdict of acquittal or 'not guilty' as to the entire offense or to some particular count or offense included in the indictment.' Code Ann. § 27-1802(a) (Ga.L.1971, pp. 460, 461). Therefore, the trial judge did not err, as contended in enumerated error 3, in refusing to direct a verdict of acquittal.
3. The third ground of enumerated error is the court's denial of the defendant's request to charge on the law of self-defense, Code Ann. § 26-902 (Ga.L.1968, pp. 1249, 1272), an affirmative defense, Code Ann. § 26-907 (Ga.L.1968, pp. 1249, 1274), which was not pleaded. Phillips v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Ins. Co., 121 Ga.App. 342(2a), 173 S.E.2d 723.
Evidence was admitted without objection, to the effect that the defendant was trying to visit his brother, who was incarcerated in jail; that the chief deputy sheriff, Sgt. Lumley, who was in charge of admitting the visitors, informed the defendant that he could not visit his brother, who already had his allowed quota of visitors with him at that time; that, after some angry conversation between the two, the defendant walked away; that, unbeknown to the defendant, Sgt. Lumley pursued the defendant into the lobby of the building and struck the defendant first with his fist as the latter was turning around in response to a warning from his friend of the impending attack; that Sgt. Lumley at no time expressed to the defendant his intention of arresting him.
The view that § 26-2505...
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