Huntley v. State
| Decision Date | 21 July 1953 |
| Citation | 66 So.2d 504 |
| Parties | HUNTLEY v. STATE (two cases). |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
T. T. Turnbull and Turnbull & Pepper, Tallahassee, for appellant.
Richard W. Ervin, Atty. Gen., and Mark R. Hawes, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
Like most tragedies this one had its beginnings innocently enough. Some time after good dark on March 8, 1952, Thomas C. Huntley and Samuel Huntley, his brother, who will be referred to as appellants unless the situation indicates otherwise, were passengers in an automobile driven by James Wilson, accompanied by two others whose names are not material, all of whom were Negroes. James Wilson attempted to turn on Peter Brown Lane on their way to The Gay Jook Joint further on down the lane, and while attempting to negotiate the turn his car slid into the ditch on the north side of the lane as the car was headed in an easterly direction. James Wilson and appellant Thomas C. Huntley proceeded on up the lane to the jook where they prevailed upon the John Henry Graham (Negro) to get his truck and pull thir car from the ditch, which he proceeded to do. Thereafter, the decedent, Mr. Jim Chancey (white) driving an old army surplus weapons carrier without a cab or body, turned into Peter Brown Lane, stopped at a position where the rear of his truck was approximately opposite the rear of the truck of John Henry Graham, who had left it there after pulling the car of James Wilson from the ditch. This truck (after having pulled the Wilson car from the ditch, to the west side headed east, same being on the north side of the lane) was left on the right side, the north side of the lane, headed west. The decedent Chancey inquired why the road was blockaded which his great uncle had put there. John Henry Graham started over toward Chancey's truck and Chancey told him to stand back. Appellant Samuel Huntley started toward Chancey who reached down and got his gun, a single barrel shotgun, and told him to stand back. At this juncture a Mr. Fred Brumley, a white man driving a similar truck to that of the decedent Chancey, appeared on the scene and parked immediately behind the Chancey truck headed east. All lights on all vehicles at the scene were burning at all times. Brumely got out of his truck and asked decedent Chancey, 'What's going on here,' and the decedent Chancey replied that he was 'going to kill four or five of these damn niggers.' At the time he voiced these words decedent Chancey was standing in the road on the left hand side of his truck by the steering wheel. During the conversation between decedent Chancey and Brumley, appellant Samuel Huntley appeared, who came back to the scene in an automobile driven by unidentified persons from a place where he had gone to seek help to get the Wilson car out of the ditch, which automobile approached from the east, from which Samuel Huntley disembarked and then the car turned around and returned in the direction from which it had arrived. Samuel Huntley walked onto the scene from the east on decedent Chancey's right. He walked down the middle of the road and when he reached a spot about opposite the rear wheels of the truck of James Henry Graham, which would place him some 8 to 12 feet from decedent Chancey, the decedent Chancey made a motion with his gun and ordered Samuel Huntley to stand back, which he did. Shortly after this occurred, another automobile driven by a Negro, Wise Blake, arrived on the scene loaded with three other Negroes who later became state's witnesses. Their names were O. B. Blake, Connell Huggins and Arthur L. Huggins. They parked their car on the right side of the road immediately behind the truck of Fred Brumley. At this juncture when the Wise Blake automobile stopped the decedent Chancey left his stand at the left front wheel of the truck, turned his back on the appellants, walked down the road to the left front of the Wise Blake automobile that had just arrived. He told the Negroes in that car, 'Boys get out and stand here, I'll let you by in a few minutes.' Two of the passengers got out and two remained in the car. Then decedent Chancey returned to his stand at the left front of his truck at a point approximately mid-way between the door and the wheel on the left side. During all of this time there was a great deal of cursing by the decedent Chancey, although some of the state's witnesses deny this. Then decedent Chancey turned back to his truck and his back to appellants at which time appellant Samuel Huntley grabbed him and took his gun from him, and as one of the witnesses testified when Samuel Huntley took the gun, said to decedent Chancey, 'I'll shoot hell out of you.' After appellant Samuel Huntley had taken decedent Chancey's gun appellant Thomas C. Huntley grabbed a standard off the truck of John Henry Graham and struck decedent Chancey over the head with it. As described in the record, a standard was a heavy wooden post approximately four feet long and varying from three to five inches in diameter. There is some conflict in the testimony as to how many blows were struck and where. A careful reading of the record leads us to the conclusion that the decedent was struck at least twice and maybe three times, as Dr. J. B. Brinson, to whom the decedent was brought before dying, testified. The first blow was struck as decedent was going to the left side of his truck or to the driver's seat and was such a severe one that it knocked him to his knees. Then decedent Chancey got up, went in front of his truck and on around to the right hand side and fell into the truck, half of his body being in and his legs and feet dangling out, at which time appellant Thomas C. Huntley struck him again on the head with the standard. The appellants in their testimony claimed that they heard someone in the crowd holler, 'Look out, he has got another gun,' or 'he is going to get another gun.' But the physical facts after the conflict fail to disclose any such weapons being present in the truck or anywhere else. As decedent lay half in the truck, appellant Samuel Huntley took the gun, reached over from the driver's side thereof and hit decedent as he lay in the truck and as a result decedent fell on the ground in a dying condition as later proved, where he remained until removed to the doctor's office. Immediately after hitting decedent with the gun, appellant Samuel Huntley then punched the lights out on decedent Chancey's truck with the butt of the shotgun. The other parties at the scene, including the white man Brumley, left as precipitately as possible, and appellants proceeded on to the jook joint and left the decedent Chancey to die, which he did, the next day...
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...to as actual malice, or malice in fact; whereas the latter is generally referred to as legal, or technical malice. See Huntley v. State, 66 So.2d 504, 507 (Fla. 1953); Ramsey v. State, 114 Fla. 766, 154 So. 855, 856 (1934). See also 52 Am.Jur.2d, Malice § 1 at 161-62 (1970); Black's Law Dic......
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