Murray v. State

• Decision Date: 05 September 1946
• Docket Number: 15487.
• Parties: MURRAY v. STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

39 S.E.2d 842

201 Ga. 201

MURRAY v. STATE.

No. 15487.

Supreme Court of Georgia

September 5, 1946

Alton Murray, alias Buddy Murray, was convicted of murder in the killing of T. W. Brantley, by shooting him with a shotgun, on November 7, 1945; the verdict containing no recommendation. The defendant's motion for a new trial, consisting of the general grounds and several special grounds added by amendment, was overruled, and he excepted.

It appeared from the evidence that Brantley was the sheriff of Candler County, in which the killing occurred, and that Brantley and Willie B. Jones, a county police officer, went to the home of Murray during the morning of November 7, for the prupose of arresting him under a warrant sworn out by his wife, Sadie Bell Murray, and charging him with the offense of assault with intent to murder. Mrs. Murray and her two daughters, who were stepdaughters of the accused, had left home some time during the previous night, but the cause of their leaving was not clearly shown by the evidence. They went to the home of a neighbor, and the defendant went there looking for them; but they had secreted themselves and he did not find them. There was no eyewitness to the killing, but Dewberry Collins, another neighbor, was in the home of the defendant and talked with him a short while before it occurred. At that time, the only other persons at the defendant's home were his infant child, about one year old, and his mother-in-law, an invalid. Collins left the house to return to his own home just as the officers were arriving, but sensing trouble, stopped behind a nearby tobacco barn. He heard the shooting, and saw and talked with the accused immediately afterwards. He testified that only two shots were fired. He and other witnesses testified that the dead body of the sheriff was found on the front porch near the door entering the dwelling house, and that the body of the police officer was lying on the ground at one end of the porch. The warrant for the arrest of Murray was found on the person of the sheriff, in one of his pockets. His pistol was lying near his right side. A witness testified that there was no way of telling whether it fell from his holster or from his hand. The pistol of officer Jones was in his holster. Dewberry Collins testified in part as follows:

'I went up to Alton Murray's home on the morning of the 7th of November, 1945, to see about grinding some cane. * * * Mr Murray's wife is named Sadie Bell. I did not see her that morning, she has got two other children besides the baby that I saw there that morning. While I was there with Mr. Murray he said something about where the other members of the family were, he told me he went to wash his feet and they dashed, he did not say when it was that they made a dash, but sometime the night though; he said he thought they went to Mr. Coursey's; he did not say anything about whether or not he was expecting them to go to some other place. While I was there I noticed some firearms, I noticed a 22 rifle and a double-barrel shotgun; the rifle and shotgun were in the right room, there was a little trunk side of this fireplace, and the stocks were on the floor and the barrels were on the trunk * * *. As to whether there was any mention made about those guns while I was in there, I mentioned myself one time, if I was him I would put them up, and he said the law may come after him, and when he said that he said he was going to kill the first one come, he said why he was expecting the law, that the law might come after him, he said his wife might go off and take a warrant for him something like that. While I was there I could tell he was under the influence of drink, whisky. I noticed that he went and stepped to the porch out there at the other end and I noticed him vomiting down there at the lower end of the porch on the back of the house. I did not detect that there was any odor of whisky on his breath I did not smell it. I did not see him drink anything while I was there * * *. I did not see anybody drive up at the front, I did not discover that there was anybody at the front until we walked to * * * the front door * * * when I discovered there was somebody out there that was the hall door leading on to the front porch. As to what I saw when I walked to the front door--he seen them, he discovered them before I did, and he said, 'There they is,' so he went back, he whirled and went back to the room * * * he turned around there at the hall door. I came down the doorsteps, I came on out the front doorsteps. I saw Mr. T. W. Brantley and Mr. Willie Jones there, I couldn't remember when I first saw them, there was one on the left side and one on the right, I mean there was one on the left of the car and one on the right of the car.

We discovered who they were while we were standing in the door both of the men had already gotten out of the car; the gate was twelve yards from the front doorsteps, and the automobile was about eight or ten steps, or yards, from the front gate on the outside. When Mr. Murray turned back into the house and I walked down the steps, I met the officers at the gate, the officers did not come in after I went out, I waited for them to come to the gate, I said something to them, I said, 'Boys, watch your step, he has got his gun and it is loaded.' If the officers made any reply to me, I didn't hear them. I then went around the barn and the officers proceeded on to the house, right on, and I went around the barn * * * the reason I took the course I did, I was listening for some guns to fire, in other words I was expecting something was going to happen; I had got to the side of the tobacco barn when I heard the gun fire, I had gotten far enough so as to have the tobacco barn between me and the front door of the house * * *. I heard two shots first, those shots were about ten seconds apart (the witness describes by clapping his hands). After I heard those shots fired, I walked out back towards the house, so I could see the house; when I got out from behind the barn, I saw Mr. Murray, he came and met me just off a piece from the tobacco barn, he was outside of the yerd when he met me; when he got to where I was, he said, 'Well, I have done just what I told you I was going to do.' and he says, 'I have played hell, ain't I?' and he said, 'Well, I am going to kill myself;' and I says, 'No, Buddy, I wouldn't do that, I would go down to Mr. Coursey's and tell him what I had done, and then go and tell my mother and father;' and I walked off about ten steps down the road with him, and he went in the direction of Mr. Coursey's * * *. I had not seen Mr. Murray go to any liquor before the officers got there. After we came from Aline, I went to the place where I saw him outside and looked for liquor and I found some under the doorsteps, it was in a half-gallon jar * * *. I did not drink any liquor while I was there and I didn't see him drink any liquor. He told me, if anybody come there he was going to kill them. I was perfectly sober, of course, sure I was. He didn't say where his wife was gone, he said he thought she was down at Mr. Coursey's; he did not say that he had had any trouble there that morning, he told me he went to wash his feet and they all left. The little baby when I went in was lying in its little cradle, it was not asleep, it was not crying at that time. Mrs. McDilda was lying in the bed in the room where we were at; I stayed in there and talked with him eight or ten or twelve minutes before the officers arrived. As to what he and I talked about, he just told me that Sadie Bell run off, and if the officers come, he was going to kill them, that is what he said; he didn't say why he was going to kill them. And directly the officers drove up, and he said then, 'There they is,' I was then standing in the door and I come down the doorsteps; I was standing in the door next to the hall, and he went back in the house, it was something like twelve steps from the doorsteps to the gate. I met the officers at the gate but not on the inside; they were on the outside but I give them time to come in. Mr. Brantley is the first one of the officers who came in and Mr. Jones followed. There wasn't any conversation between me and Mr. Brantley; I just told them, I say, 'Boys, watch your step, he has got his gun and that is loaded,' and they never give me no reply; I told Mr. Brantley that and Mr. Jones, 'Boys, watch your step, he has got his guns and they are loaded;' they did not stop, they heard me, but they didn't stop at all, they just walked right on * * *. The officers were both armed, they had their pistols, and I saw their pistols, I saw the officers' pistols. I have known Mr. Murray ten or fifteen years I guess, I don't remember exactly but something like that. When I went back behind the tobacco barn, I was expecting something to happen. I was expecting the guns to fire because that is what he said was going to do I thought he was going to kill the officer if he went in there; I thought that because he told me he was. I say I have been knowing Mr. Murray around fifteen or twenty years. As to whether I would say that Mr. Murray is a moron or whether he is a man of good sense--that morning, he was off bad that morning; I mean by saying that he was off bad that morning, the way he talked and done, he was about crazy that morning; I have never known of him having just such spells as that before since I have been living there by him. I don't remember about a couple of years ago that he went crazy over there and was crazy two weeks and carried to his father's * * *. He told me he was going to kill the officers, he was in such condition that morning that he seemed to know right from wrong, and when I came in contact with him after the shooting he said, ...