Little v. State

• Decision Date: 13 November 1956
• Docket Number: No. 2,No. 36287,36287,2
• Citation: 95 S.E.2d 474,94 Ga.App. 557
• Parties: R. L. LITTLE v. The STATE
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

Page 474

95 S.E.2d 474

94 Ga.App. 557

R. L. LITTLE v. The STATE.

No. 36287.

Court of Appeals of Georgia, Division No. 2.

Nov. 13, 1956.

Syllabus by the Court.

1. The evidence amply supports the verdict.

2. The court did not err as regards any of the special grounds.

Robert Lee Little was indicted for assault with intent to murder in that the accused 'in the County of Fulton and the State of Georgia on the 6th day of January, 1956, with malice aforethought, did assault, cut, stab and wound one Willie Lee Price with a knife, the same being a weapon likely to produce death, with intent then and there to kill and murder the said person so assaulted.' He was found guilty of the offense of stabbing. Counsel for the defendant filed a motion for new trial on the statutory grounds and later amended it so as to add several special grounds. The motion for new trial was denied and the case is here on exceptions to that judgment.

The evidence shows that during the afternoon of January 6, 1956, Robert Lee Little and T. J. Speer went to Marietta, Georgia, where they bought some shotgun shells and rifle cartridges; that they stopped later and went into the woods and shot some squirrels; that they arrived home about dark and learned that Willie Lee Price had called the defendant and left a message for the defendant to come to Price's home to collect some money that Price owed the defendant; that the defendant and Speer rode to Price's home; that the defendant got out of the car and went into the house and collected $15 from Price; that the defendant expressed some dissatisfaction with the amount of the payment; that the defendant was in the house three or four minutes and when he came out Price was walking behind him and after the defendant got in the car Price walked on out in front of the car; that when the defendant and Speer left Price, Price was standing in the front of his house. It seems that when the defendant and Speer arrived at Price's house there was a lot of commotion there between four or five men who were around and about Price's house; that when the defendant and Speer left Price's house they went to Barnett's place where they stayed until about 9:45, when Speer went home, leaving the defendant at Barnett's place where he remained until about 10; that the defendant and other people went to another place where they had a few drinks, remaining until about 12; that Speer appeared at this place and suggested that he would carry the defendant home since the defendant was too intoxicated to drive safely; that Speer did take the defendant home. It seems that when the defendant was at the home of Price, after he collected the $15 and expressed dissatisfaction, as he was leaving Price's home, someone knocked Price down. The victim, Price, stated that the defendant knocked him down and then stabbed him. This was denied by the defendant. Other witnesses testified that the defendant was the person who stabbed the victim, Price.

Smith B. West, R. B. Lambert, Atlanta, for plaintiff in error.

Paul Webb, Sol. Gen., Charlie O. Murphy, Eugene L Tiller, Atlanta, for defendant in error.

GARDNER, Presiding Judge.

1. Although the evidence is somewhat conflicting, the jury was sufficiently impressed by the evidence against the defendant to return a verdict of unlawful stabbing. There is sufficient evidence to sustain this verdict. The general grounds are without merit.

2. Special ground 1 of the amended motion for new trial is insufficient to present an issue for determination by this court. It complains that the court erred 'in allowing the assistant solicitor-general to plead entrapment and to cross-examine the State's main witness, Willie Price, without laying any such foundation for such plea of entrapment and right to cross-examine this witness when this witness had testified that he did not know who cut him; the only thing he knew was that the one last with him was Mr. Little when they came out of the house (witness's home) 'but just knowing that he did it the witness would not say because he just don't exactly know.' It then contends that the admission of this evidence was harmful, injurious and prejudicial to the defendant 'in that the said assistant solicitor was attemping to make the witness testify to something that the witness did not know, and which the said witness had previously said he did not know, and the solicitor was then and there attempting to impeach the State's witness in the presence of the jury because the said witness refused to testify to something the witness did not know.'

The evidence referred to in the amended motion as being harmful is thereby shown to be the very testimony of the victim of the stabbing to the effect that he did not know who stabbed him. This testimony could in no wise be harmful to the defendant. This ground of the amended motion then goes on to complain that it...