Dugan v. State

• Decision Date: 10 December 1928
• Docket Number: 27657
• Citation: 119 So. 298,151 Miss. 781
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: DUGAN v. STATE. [*]

119 So. 298

151 Miss. 781

DUGAN v. STATE. ^[*]

No. 27657

Supreme Court of Mississippi

December 10, 1928

Division A

1. CRIMINAL LAW. Failure to object or reserve exception to alleged errors in trial precluded, consideration thereof on appeal, though defendant was not represented by counsel.

Failure to object or reserve exception to alleged errors committed on trial precludes consideration thereof on appeal notwithstanding the fact that defendant was not represented by counsel, since the same rules of procedure apply in the case where litigant prosecutes or defends his own case as when he is represented by counsel.

2. CRIMINAL LAW. Defendant, failing to request time to employ counsel, cannot complain of error because of denial of opportunity therefor.

Where defendant failed to request time in which to employ counsel which his case was called for trial, he could not complain of error by reason of denial of opportunity to obtain counsel particularly since there was no request for permission to communicate with and employ counsel denied when he was in jail prior to his trial.

HON. J Q. LANGSTON, Judge.

APPEAL from circuit court of Lamar county, HON. J. Q. LANGSTON, Judge.

James Dugan was convicted of robbery, and he appeals. Affirmed.

Affirmed.

W. A. Shipman, Ruth L. Waller, and Anderson & Anderson, for appellant.

Rufus Creekmore, Assistant Attorney-General, for the state.

Argued orally by W. A. Shipman and Mrs. Ruth L. Waller, for appellant and Rufus Creekmore, Assistant Attorney-General, for the state.

OPINION

SMITH, C. J.

The appellant was convicted of robbery on evidence from which his guilt is manifest. He was not represented by counsel at the trial, but conducted his own defense in person. After the verdict was rendered, a motion for a new trial was made for him by counsel, setting forth a number of alleged errors that were committed on the trial. This motion was overruled, and the errors there complained of are here also assigned. There is no merit in any of the assignments of error, and, if there were, they could not be here considered, for the reason that no objection thereto was made, or exception thereto reserved, in the court below.

That the appellant was not represented by counsel is of no consequence, for the same rules of procedure apply in a case wherein a litigant prosecutes or defends his own case, as when he is represented therein by counsel.

The assignment of error most seriously pressed is that the appellant was denied an opportunity to obtain counsel. The ground on which this complaint rests was made to appear by the evidence introduced on the motion for a new trial, and was to the effect that the appellant, after his arrest, and for some time before his indictment...