State v. Hough
| Decision Date | 05 June 1947 |
| Docket Number | 721. |
| Citation | 42 S.E.2d 659,227 N.C. 596 |
| Parties | STATE v. HOUGH. |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
Criminal prosecution on indictment charging the defendant with the slaying of one Cleona Suber, with a deady weapon, towit, an automobile.
The State's evidence tends to show that on the night of 17 March, 1946, Clarence Counts was returning in his automobile from a roadhouse near Winston-Salem when he had a puncture. He went to town, secured a wrecker and returned with Albert V. Brown driving. They passed the Counts car, turned the wrecker around and stopped it off the pavement about 10 feet behind the Counts car, with its lights burning, brakes set and the motor running. Before Counts and Brown could get out of the wrecker, it was struck from the rear by a LaSalle car driven by the defendant, and pushed forward about six feet. After striking the wrecker the defendant's car swerved by the wrecker, ran off to the left side of the highway, ran up and down an embankment careened back across the highway and turned over about 130 feet from the point of collision. The defendant's car was demolished and one of its occupants, Cleona Suber, was killed. Soon after the defendant's car came to rest, some one threw a bottle out of it into the field nearby. It was found to be a pint bottle with a small amount of whiskey in it. The defendant had a strong odor of listerine on his breath. The time of the collision was about 1:30 a.m., and the moon was shining brightly. There was no other traffic in sight at the time.
According to the defendant's evidence he was also returning from a roadhouse, and just before the impact he met a trucktrailer with its lights on, going in the opposite direction. Because of this he did not see the parked wrecker in time to avoid sideswiping it. The wrecker was not entirely off the pavement, and it was unlighted. The defendant says: .
At the close of the evidence, the court sustained the motion to nonsuit as to Albert V. Brown and overruled it as to Mitchell A. Hough.
Verdict Guilty.
Judgment Six months on the roads.
The defendant appeals, assigning errors.
Harry M. McMullan, Atty. Gen., and T.W. Bruton, Hughes J. Rhodes and Ralph M.Moody, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
Deal & Hutchins, of Winston-Salem, for defendant.
Viewing the evidence in its most favorable light for the prosecution, the accepted position on motion to nonsuit, it seems sufficient to carry the case to the jury. It is true the defendant's evidence, if accepted in its entirety, would tend to leave the question of culpable negligence in doubt. State...
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