Hollins v. State, 49705
| Decision Date | 16 October 1974 |
| Docket Number | No. 49705,No. 2,49705,2 |
| Citation | 210 S.E.2d 354,133 Ga.App. 183 |
| Parties | Charles W. HOLLINS, Jr. v. The STATE |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
Fred Raskin, Louisville, for appellant.
James C. Abbot, Sol., Louisville, for appellee.
Syllabus Opinion by the Court
Hollins was convicted of the offense of 'pimping, in that he offered or agreed to procure a prostitute, to wit: Nancy Parson, for another, to wit: Lee Otis Hannah.' His motion for new trial was overruled and he appeals. Held:
1. Only by the testimony of the state's witness, Lee Otis Hannah, who swore that he gave the defendant five dollars for a date with the girl in his truck, could the defendant be convicted under the evidence offered here. A ground of the motion for new trial, supported by affidavits and uncontradicted by the court or otherwise, recites that while the court was instructing the jury defendant's counsel received a note signed Lee Otis Hannah and scrawled, 'I want to tell the truth.' He showed this missive to the court, asking that Hannah be recalled and further cross examination allowed. The judge refused. Hannah's subsequently written affidavit states that his testimony of giving the defendant money was untrue, was suggested to him by assumptions made of officers in interrogating him, and was elicited from him through fear by statements suggesting that he would otherwise himself be prosecuted and sent to prison.
This case is markedly different from Fowler v. State, 187 Ga. 406(7), 1 S.E.2d 18 and other cases cited by the state. There the recantation came after the case had terminated, the verdict been returned, and the jury dispersed. Here, during the progress of the trial, the parties became aware of strong and easily verifiable or refutable indications that testimony at that moment being weighed by the jury was in fact untrue. The basic axiom of justice, which has appeared in every Georgia Code, is that, 'The object of all legal investigation is the discovery of truth' and the rules of evidence seek 'always for pure sources.' Code § 38-101. This obtains in all cases except where 'it would be more unjust and productive of more evil to hear the truth than to forbear the investigation.' Code § 38-114. The reception of perjured evidence is never justice, no matter how salutary the end in view. In Maddox v. State, 68 Ga. 294, it was held that the exercise of the court's discretion in refusing to reopen a case would...
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...419, 54 Am.R. 472 (1885); Globe etc. Ins. Co. v. Atlantic etc. Shipping Co., 51 Ga.App. 904, 181 S.E. 310 (1935); Hollins v. State, 133 Ga.App. 183, 210 S.E.2d 354 (1974). In order to create an estoppel as authorized by OCGA § 24-4-24, the evidence must show that the party relying on such e......
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... ... "The reception of perjured evidence is never justice, no matter how salutary the end in view." Hollins v. State, 133 Ga.App. 183, 184, 210 ... S.E.2d 354 (1974). Thus, a party cannot do indirectly that which he or she is prohibited from doing ... ...
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