State v. Hall

• Decision Date: 23 December 1919
• Docket Number: 10315.
• Citation: State v. Hall, 137 S.C. 261, 101 S.E. 662 (S.C. 1919)
• Parties: STATE v. HALL.
• Court: South Carolina Supreme Court

101 S.E. 662

137 S.C. 261

STATE v. HALL.

No. 10315.

Supreme Court of South Carolina

December 23, 1919

Appeal from General Sessions Circuit Court of Aiken County; Edward McIver, Judge.

Dalton Hall was convicted of murder, and appeals. Reversed and remanded.

J. E Stansfield and J. B. Salley, both of Aiken, for appellant.

R. L Gunter, Sol., and D. S. Henderson, both of Aiken, for the State.

GARY C.J.

The following statement of the facts by his honor the presiding judge appears in the record:

"The defendant, Dalton Hall, was indicted by the grand jury of Aiken county at the January term of the court of general sessions for the year 1919, the indictment charging that the said Dalton Hall murdered Foster Kale at Graniteville, in the county of Aiken and state aforesaid, on October 22, 1918, by shooting him with a pistol. The defendant's plea to the indictment was not guilty, and he was put upon trial on that plea, and on the issues raised thereby. The evidence introduced on the part of the state tended to prove the charge as made, that the defendant, with malice aforethought, killed and murdered the deceased, Foster Kale, at a house in the town of Graniteville, in the county and state aforesaid. The testimony on the part of the defense tended to prove that the defendant, Dalton Hall, acted in self-defense. The case remained on trial for two days, and at the end of the second day the jury found the defendant guilty of murder, and recommended him to mercy.

The case came on for trial on January 16th and continued on the morning of January 17th. On that morning, when the court convened, one of the jurors, A. H. Fulmer, notified the court and counsel that, when he went to his home several miles in the country the night before, he found his brother had been stricken with paralysis, and that he was unconscious, and he wished to be excused from the jury. The counsel for the state, Messrs. Gunter and Henderson, and the counsel for the defendant, who then represented said defendant, and the defendant, Dalton Hall, himself, being present in court, but saying nothing, agreed that the juror could be excused, and that the trial should continue with 11 jurors. Thereupon the juror did not enter the panel, and the case continued with 11 jurors sitting, by the full consent of the defendant's counsel. No ruling was asked of the court on the subject, and none was made, and no question was then made, or at any time by the defendant or his counsel, that the trial could not proceed with eleven jurors. Besides the defendant being present, there was present, sitting at the table with the defendant and his counsel, the father and mother of the defendant, and no protest was made. The defendant was a man of 18 years of age, and after this matter took place in open court he testified on his own behalf lengthily and intelligently. The case went to the jury after argument of counsel, and no request to charge was made to the judge on the question of any alleged illegality of the jury and after the jury had rendered its verdict on the next day to wit, the 18th day of January, defendant's counsel made a motion for a new trial on the minutes of the court in behalf of his client, and argued it fully and completely, but no question was made as to the said alleged illegality of the jury. That motion for a new trial was refused by the judge, after due consideration upon the

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