Milner v. State

• Decision Date: 09 November 1905
• Citation: 124 Ga. 86,52 S.E. 302
• Parties: MILNER. v. STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

52 S.E. 302

124 Ga. 86

MILNER.

v.STATE.

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Nov. 9, 1905.

1. Criminal Law—Confessions — Admissibility.

"Whether subsequent confessions, of themselves wholly unexceptionable, were made under previous influences still operating on the mind, is a question not of law for the court, but of fact for the jury." Pines v. State, 21 Ga. 227.

2. Same—New Trial.

In order for the admission of illegal evidence to constitute a sufficient ground for a new trial, the motion should show that the illegal evidence was objected to when offered, and the specific objection thus made must also be set forth.

3. Same—Verdict Contrary to Law.

A ground of a motion alleging that the verdict is contrary to a specified part of the charge of the court will be construed to mean that the verdict is contrary to law.

4. Homicide—Evidence.

There was sufficient evidence to authorize the verdict.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error from Superior Court, Spalding County; E. J. Reagan, Judge.

Ralph Milner was convicted of murder, and brings error. Affirmed.

L. P. Goodrich, D. J. Bailey, and Robt. T. Daniel, for plaintiff in error.

O. H. B. Bloodworth, Sol. Gen., Jos. D. Boyd, and Jno. C. Hart, Atty. Gen., for the State.

BECK, J. Ralph Milner was tried on an indictment for murder, and convicted. The state proved the corpus delicti by several witnesses, and proved a confession of the defendant by one witness, the sheriff of the county, and also by another witness, one Terrell, that the defendant in his statement on a preliminary trial circumstantially and positively admitted and confessed the crimewith which he was charged. In the incriminating statement upon the preliminary trial the defendant averred that when he killed the deceased, one Rufe Farley, who at the time was armed with a gun, commanded him to do the act, saying, "Damn you, you have got to kill him, and if you don't I will kill you;" that when the deceased approached the place near which the killing occurred, he said to the defendant, "Hello, Ralph; have you found anything to kill?" to which the defendant replied, "No sir; I haven't found anything;" that he then joined the deceased, and walked along with him; that Parley came over to where they were, and walked "in behind" defendant with his gun cocked; that they walked along, talking to the deceased, and just before the shooting Farley said to the defendant, "Are you going to do what you said?" whereupon the defendant raised his gun, and shot the deceased "without taking any sight, " the gun being within about two feet of the deceased's head when he shot; and that, after the deceased fell, Rufe Farley beat him with a stick and robbed him. The defendant's confession was corroborated by proof of the corpus delicti and numerous circumstances attending the commission of the crime. There was nothing to show that more than one other person besides the deceased was present at the killing. The defendant made a statement in substance as follows: "When I shot, I shot at a fishhawk. * * * I told Mr. Terrell and Mr. Head that [referring to his confession] because I thought that they were trying to get me out. How I come to believe in Mr. Terrell, he wanted to hire me again in the spring, and I thought he was trying to get me out. He told me he would get me out, and wanted me to work for him, and said he would get me a lawyer." After being convicted, the defendant made a motion for a new trial upon several grounds; the first three being the general grounds and the others being as follows: "(4) Because the court erred in permitting the witness Terrell to testify what the boy stated on the next day after this confession was obtained, and in the presence of this witness on the preliminary trial, said witness sitting in the courtroom inside the bar railing. The testimony of the witness which should not have been allowed to go to the jury is as follows: 'He went on to tell about his killing Sam Jones. He said on Thursday afternoon he went down in the woods, close to where Sam was killed, and he had his gun, and was hunting squirrels. He stayed awhile there, sitting on a stump near where he killed old man Sam. Rufe Farley came to him about sundown, and he said that old Sam Jones was coming down through a piece of corn from the pasture, driving a cow. He said Rufe stepped up to him, and took a cut shell of his own gun and put it in Ralph's gun, and taken a shell out of his pocket and put it in his own gun. and picked up a big red-oak stick, seven or eight feet long and about eight inches round, and said, "Yonder comes a man that owes me money and won't pay. Damn you, you got to kill him, and if you don't, I will kill you." He said that old man Sam Jones came along the woods and said: "Hello, Ralph, have you found anything to kill?" He said, "No sir; I haven't found anything, " and got up and walked along with him. Rufe Farley came over the upper side of the road, out of the edge of the woods, and walked in behind him with his gun cocked. He went along talking to old man Sam, and got close to where old man Sam was killed, and Rufe said to him, "Are you going to do what you said?" and Rufe had his gun cocked on him; that he raised his gun and shot him. They asked him if he took any sight, and he said he didn't, he just raised his gun. He had the gun about two feet of the old man Sam's head when he shot. As soon as he shot, old man Sam fell, and he broke and run towards his home. He said that Rufe done the beating of him with the stick, and the robbing of him, and such as that.' Defendant claims that the admission of the above testimony was error, because it was made next day after the confession was obtained from the...