State v. Knight

• Decision Date: 21 May 1958
• Docket Number: No. 219,219
• Citation: 103 S.E.2d 452,248 N.C. 384
• Parties: STATE, v. Johnnle D. KNIGHT, Jr.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

Page 452

103 S.E.2d 452

248 N.C. 384

STATE, v. Johnnle D. KNIGHT, Jr.

No. 219

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

May 21, 1958

George B. Patton, Atty. Gen., and Ralph Moody, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

W. O. Rosser, Whitakers, and W. O. Warner, Rocky Mount, for defendant, appellant.

JOHNSON, Justice.

The first assignment of error challenges the trial court's ruling in denying the defendant's motion for judgment as of nonsuit as to the charge of first degree murder. The assignment brings into focus the evidence on which the State relies. It is summarized in pertinent part as follows:

The deceased, Myra Brown Manning, aged 43, lived with her husband and two sons just beyond the corporate limits of the Town of Bailey in Nash County. The defendant, Johnnie D. Knight, Jr., is a deaf and dumb Negro, who worked at various odd jobs in the vicinity of Bailey. His age is not shown, but he is referred to as a man. He went to school from 1939 to 1946 and reached the sixth grade. One of the defendant's odd jobs was feeding hogs for Unus Peel in a pasture located a short distance back of the Manning home.

Mrs. Manning's husband worked for Farmer Brothers, whose place of business was about a mile from the Manning home. She usually went for him in the family car when work was over in the afternoon, but on the afternoon of 5 March, 1957, she did not go for him. At about 5:40 p. m. Rayborn Manning, her son, arrived home and found the car was not there. In the house he found signs of an apparent struggle: his mother's glasses were lying on the table. Shoe marks were on the floor, marks were on the wall, and the rug in the bedroom was turned sideways. Her shoes were there, but were 'a little ways apart.' The bedspread was turned back, and what appeared to be black knee prints were on the bed, and his mother's hair net was lying on the bed. A piece of note paper, balled up, was lying on the corner of the bedspread. Rayborn left the house and located his father at a nearby store. They went to the home of Mrs. Manning's sister. The car was not there, so they returned home after calling peace officers. The husband and the officers described in detail the signs they found in the Manning home. They testified to the same conditions found earlier by the son and, in addition, that bloodstains were seen at various places and that the fire poker was in the wood box upside down with indications it had been used as a weapon. The family car was gone from the back yard. Searching parties were organized and went out from the home. Later that night the dead body of Mrs. Manning was found near the town dump heap, some 25 or 30 yards beyond where the car was stuck in the mud on the side of a dirt road. Mrs. Manning's body showed she had been cut, beaten, mutilated and killed in a shocking manner.

A large work-shoe track was found near Mrs. Manning's body. The witness Jack Griffin measured the width and length of the track. The heel appeared to have left the imprint of the brand of the shoe. Next morning, when Johnnie Knight went down to feed the hogs back of the Manning home, Griffin saw him and after he left went out and measured his tracks and found they had the same measurements and brand imprint as the track found near the body of Mrs. Manning.

Later in the day, the defendant was taken into custody by Sheriff Womble. He was taken to the Bailey Police Department. In his pocket were found a hawkbill knife with blood on it, a pencil and notebook, and some cards on which were pictures of naked white women. That night (6 March, 1957), in the city jail in Rocky Mount sheriff Womble and S. B. I. Agent Wilson examined the defendant by the method of having him write notes in the form of answers to written questions. The defendant was examined again by the same method on 12 March, 1957. Each time he confessed killing Mrs. Manning.

The evidence discloses that both confessions were made under circumstances rendering them competent and admissible, and justifying the inference that they were voluntarily made under application of rules applied in numerous decisions of this Court. See State v. Rogers, 233 N.C. 390, 64 S.E. 2d 572, 28 A.L.R.2d 1104; State v. Whitener, 191 N.C. 659, 132 S.E. 603. Two confessions later made by the defendant were excluded, for failure to show to the satisfaction of the court that they were voluntarily made.

In his confessions of 6 and 12 March the defendant stated in part: that he knew Mrs. Manning was alone in the house; that he knocked on the front door and got into the house; that he went there 'to try to f... her'; that by means of a written note--the one found on the bedspread--he made a proposal of sexual intercourse to Mrs. Manning; that she got scared and tried to make him leave the house; that he struck her with the fire poker and also cut her throat with his knife, and then wrapped a towel around her neck and put her in the Manning family car parked behind the house; that he drove the car out to the place where it was found near the town dump heap, pulled Mrs. Manning out, and left her in the woods about 50 feet beyond the car, where she was later found; that she was not dead when he took her out of the car. The defendant later went with the officers and pointed out where he left the car, showed them how he pulled Mrs. Manning out of the car, pointed out a spot of blood on the ground where the body had been found, and found for them in a nearby cornfield a piece of towel with bloodstains on it.

Dr. John Chamblee, who examined the body to determine the cause of death, testified in part as follows:

'The first finding on the head was a deep cut on the back left side of the head which was approximately 2 1/2 inches long and went through all of the layers of the skull down to the bone. * * * It was a ragged type of wound. In my opinion that wound was made from a blow by a blunt instrument rather than a cut from a sharp instrument. * * * It (referring to throat wounds shown on a photograph) shows a gaping wound in the center of the throat just below the level of the voice box. That wound entered into the windpipe, cut into the windpipe. * * * A number of cuts and bruises were also found on the body and on the throat there were several light cuts. They were through the skin but did not go deeper than the skin. They were criss-crossed across her throat about three of them approximately six inches long, * * *. Also on the left side of the throat at the lower part of the throat there was a stab type wound. * * * Also there was a large bruise on the left side of the jaw. * * * There was a bruise across the bridge of the nose, a big bruise surrounding the right eye, a smaller bruise at the corner of the left eye, and there were three bruises on the outer surface of the left forearm. There was a large bruise on the right shoulder, * * *. There were two bruises on the inner surface of the right thigh approximately the size of a silver dollar, * * *. On examination of the left hand there was a deep cut across the fingers that was to the bone on the index and middle finger. * * * There was a deep cut between the thumb and the index finger into the palm of the hand on the fatty part of the palm next to the thumb and there were several light cuts across the palm of the hand. They were not clean through the skin but they were shallow cuts made, in my opinion, with a sharp instrument. Coming back to the largest wound in the center of the throat, * * * it was kind of a rounded wound like someone had cored it out. The wound was open. * * * I examined her to see whether she had been raped and my examination and lab tests ruled out rape. In my opinion Mrs. Manning's death was caused from loss of blood from the cuts on her throat and the cuts on the back of her head. She bled to death.' Dr. Chamblee further testified that the cut wounds 'could have been made with an instrument like' the defendant's knife which was offered in evidence; and that 'the blow on her head could...