Deal v. State

• Decision Date: 11 April 1916
• Docket Number: 319.
• Citation: 88 S.E. 573,145 Ga. 33
• Parties: DEAL v. STATE. HILL v. STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

88 S.E. 573

145 Ga. 33

DEAL v. STATE.

HILL v. STATE.

No. 319.

Supreme Court of Georgia

April 11, 1916

Syllabus by the Court.

On the trial of one for murder, where the evidence of the defendant's statement at the trial would authorize the jury to find that the person killing acted in self-defense on account of a reasonable fear aroused in his mind by words threats, or menaces, in connection with the other facts in the case, it is not erroneous for the court, in instructing the jury on the law of voluntary manslaughter, as contained in Penal Code of 1910, § 65, to fail or refuse to charge in immediate connection therewith the right of the jury to consider words, threats, or menaces in determining whether the circumstances attending the homicide were such as to justify the fears of a reasonable man that his life was in imminent danger or that a felony was about to be committed upon his person.

Instructions on the law of voluntary manslaughter and justifiable homicide should be independent of each other.

Although the facts of a given case might authorize an instruction as to the right of the jury to consider words, menaces, or threats, in connection with the facts of the case, as being sufficient to arouse the fears of a reasonable man that his person was in apparent or real danger of a felonious attack or that his life was in imminent danger, the failure to give such an instruction would not be erroneous solely for the reason that the court gave in charge to the jury the law of voluntary manslaughter in the language of Penal Code 1910, § 65.

Certified Questions from Court of Appeals.

Deal and Hill were convicted of homicide, and bring error. Question certified by Court of Appeals. Answered.

Griffith & Matthews, of Buchanan, for plaintiff in error.

J. R Hutcheson, Sol. Gen., of Douglasville, and C. B. Weatherly of Buchanan, for the State.

Deal Case:

Deal & Renfroe and H. B. Strange, all of Statesboro, and B. T. Rawlings, of Sandersville, for plaintiff in error.

R. Lee Moore, Sol. Gen., and J. J. E. Anderson, both of Statesboro, and Hines & Jordan, of Atlanta, for the State.

EVANS P.J.

The Court of Appeals propounds the following question:

"On the trial of one indicted for murder, where the evidence or the defendant's statement at the trial would authorize the jury to find that the person killing acted in self-defense on account of a reasonable fear aroused in his mind by words, threats, or menaces, in connection with the other facts in the case, is it for any reason error for the court to charge the jury that 'in no case' is provocation by words, threats, or menaces sufficient to free the person killing from the guilt and crime of murder, or to read to the jury the Code section relating to voluntary manslaughter, which contains such language (Penal Code, § 65), without qualification or explanation in immediate connection therewith or elsewhere in the charge, or without instructing the jury as to their right to consider words, threats, or menaces in determining whether the circumstances leading up to or attending the homicide were such as as to justify the fears of a reasonable man that his life was in imminent danger, or that a felony was about to be committed upon his person? In the absence of such qualification or explanation, is such an instruction subject to the criticism that it tends to convey to the minds of jurors the idea that they cannot consider words, threats, or menaces in determining whether the killing was justifiable?"

We think that the rulings in Price v. State, 137 Ga. 71, 72 S.E. 908, and Futch v. State, 137 Ga. 75, 72 S.E. 911, afford an answer to the question. In the first case it was ruled:

"The statute defining voluntary manslaughter contains the declaration that 'provocation by words, threats, menaces, or contemptuous gestures shall in no case be sufficient to free the person killing from the guilt and crime of murder.' The reading by the court of the entire Code section definitive of voluntary manslaughter (Penal Code, § 65) containing the quoted language, while charging on the subject of voluntary manslaughter, is not subject to the criticism that by so doing the court entrenched upon the law of justifiable homicide, in that the reading of the section tended to convey to the jury the implication that they could

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