State v. Lawrence

• Decision Date: 23 January 1929
• Docket Number: 75.
• Citation: 146 S.E. 395,196 N.C. 562
• Parties: STATE v. LAWRENCE.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

146 S.E. 395

196 N.C. 562

STATE v. LAWRENCE.

No. 75.

Supreme Court of North Carolina

January 23, 1929

Appeal from Superior Court, Chatham County; R. A. Nunn, Judge.

W. H Lawrence was convicted of murder in the second degree, and he appeals. No error. This defendant was indicted for murder in the first degree of Mrs. Annie Terry. He was convicted of murder in the second degree. The judgment of the court below was that the defendant be confined in the state's prison for a term of 30 years. The material evidence will be considered in the opinion.

Fuller Reade & Fuller, of Durham, Long & Bell, of Pittsboro, and Pou & Pou and J. L. Emanuel, all of Raleigh, for appellant.

D. G Brummitt, Atty. Gen., and Frank Nash, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

CLARKSON J.

The defendant, at the close of the state's evidence and at the close of all the evidence, moved to dismiss the action or for judgment of nonsuit. C. S.§ 4643. The court below denied the motions. This constitutes defendant's sole exceptions and assignments of error. The only question involved in this appeal: Was there sufficient evidence of defendant's guilt to be submitted to the jury? We think so.

On motion to dismiss or judgment of nonsuit, the evidence is to be taken in the light most favorable to the state, and it is entitled to the benefit of every resonable intendment upon the evidence and every reasonable inference to be drawn therefrom. "An exception to a motion to dismiss in a criminal action taken after the close of the State's evidence, and renewed by defendant after the introduction of his own evidence, does not confine the appeal to the State's evidence alone, and a conviction will be sustained under the second exception if there is any sufficient evidence on the whole record of the defendant's guilt." State v. Earp, 196 N.C. at page 166, 145 S.E. 24. See State v. Carlson, 171 N.C. 818, 89 S.E. 30; State v. Sigmon, 190 N.C. 684, 130 S.E. 854. The evidence favorable alone to the state is considered; defendant's evidence is discarded. State v. Utley, 126 N.C. 997, 35 S.E. 428. The competency, admissibility, and sufficiency of evidence is for the court to determine; the weight, effect, and credibility is for the jury. State v. Utley, supra; State v. Blackwelder, 182 N.C. 899, 109 S.E. 644. The evidence in the case was circumstantial.

In State v. Plyler, 153 N.C. at page 636, 69 S.E. 272, this court approved the charge of the court below, which was as follows: "The law says that circumstantial evidence is a recognized and accepted instrumentality in the ascertainment of truth; and it is essential and when properly understood and applied is highly satisfactory in matters of the gravest moment. The facts, relations, connections and combinations between the circumstances should be natural, clear, reasonable and satisfactory. When such evidence is relied upon to convict, it should be clear, convincing and conclusive in all its combinations and should exclude all reasonable doubt as to guilt. In passing upon such evidence, it is the duty of the jury to consider all circumstances relied upon to convict and to determine whether they have been established beyond a reasonable doubt. If not so established, the circumstance should be excluded from further consideration and have no weight in reaching a verdict. The State puts up a witness here and undertakes to prove a circumstance; you will first determine in your mind, Is this circumstance established beyond a reasonable doubt? If you say that circumstance has been established beyond a reasonable doubt, you take that into consideration in determining what verdict you will find. 'After considering the evidence in this way, and determining the circumstances which are established beyond a reasonable doubt, the next thing for the jury to determine is, Do these circumstances exclude every other reasonable conclusion except that of guilt? If so the evidence is sufficient to convict; otherwise, not."'

This court, in approving the above charge, which was made by Judge Wm. R. Allen in the court below, afterwards a member of this court, made this observation: "Give it our approval as a lucid statement of the law." State v. Brackville, 106 N.C. 701, 710, 11 S.E. 284; State v. Austin, 129 N.C. 534, 40 S.E. 4; State v. Flemming, 130 N.C. 688, 41 S.E. 549; State v. Wilcox, 132 N.C. at page 1137, 1138, 44 S.E. 625; State v. Willoughby, 180 N.C. 676, 103 S.E. 903; State v. Blackwelder, supra; State v. Sigmon, supra.

In an analysis of the evidence, let us consider:

(1) The Corpus Delicti--the Body of a Crime.--In the present case, there is no question as to the corpus delicti. On March 24, 1928, some men were fishing in the Cape Fear river above Avent's Ferry bridge. D. F. Osborne, a witness for the state, testified that about 11 o'clock at night he heard an automobile approaching the bridge from the Chatham county side. "I heard a woman's voice screaming 'Don't kill me, please don't kill me' two or three times. Then for a few minutes the cries closed and I heard the sound of a large splash or some large object fell into the river and in a minute or two somebody struggling in the water and crying out 'Save me,' 'Lord have mercy, save me.' 'Help! Help!' We got Mr. Harrington (a deputy sheriff) also his brother, and got back to the bridge around one o'clock, maybe one-thirty. I heard the same woman's voice, but much weaker, calling for help from down the river below the bridge. Sounded like it was three or four hundred yards down the river. Mr. Harrington and Dickens got in a boat and went down the river toward it but it ceased before they got there."

Mrs. Mary Yandel, a daughter of Mrs. Annie Terry, on April 3, 1928, identified the body of her mother down the river about three miles from the bridge. "She had bruises on her face and head."

(2) The Motive.F"F"It is never indispensible to a conviction that a motive for the commission of the crime should appear. But when the state, as in this case, has to rely upon circumstantial evidence to establish the guilt of the defendant, it is not only competent, but often very important, in strengthening the evidence for the prosecution, to show a motive for committing the crime." State v. Green, 92 N.C. at page 782; State v. Stratford, 149 N.C. 483, 62 S.E. 882; State v. Wilkins, 158 N.C. 603, 73 S.E. 992.

Fifteen letters were introduced in evidence from defendant to Mrs. Annie Terry, all signed "Rover." Mrs. Terry had been a widow for some 15 years before she was killed. She and defendant lived in Durham--defendant in the same apartment in which his niece and her husband lived, but was a contractor, and the letters indicated was away mostly at work. A great number of the letters were in reference to Saturday night engagements. One requested her to come to Salisbury Sunday night to see him. A number of letters mentioned that he would phone her. Two of the letters mentioned that when he got there Saturday night he would phone her about 7 o'clock and one that they would go for a ride; one "I think my people are going to be out of town and if they are we can make things all O. K." One of the letters in which he wishes her to "come part of the way back with me Sunday evening and go back Monday morning," had written below, "Burn this. " One letter, of September 27, 1927, said: "I don't see what you keep on about women for as I have not hardly spoken to a girl since I have been here. I have tried to be good to you and told you the truth on all occasions, and I can't see to save my life what pleasure you get out of trying to make my life so unpleasant for me. If there was any reason for it, it would be different. But it certainly does hurt me to get such a letter with no cause." Another letter says: "This is another case of where you let your imagination run away with you, and I am getting tired of getting such letters, when there has never been any cause for one, and it looks like to me that you could realize that sometime." A letter which seems to have been written in December, 1927, says: "Now if you let him know anything it will mean that I will have to leave this country for he has not got any sense about such things, and I think it will be to your benefit to think before you say too much."

The letters indicated an illicit relationship. Mrs. Annie Terry kept these letters. Defendant, from the letters, knew he was dealing with a woman he could not trifle with. The defendant and Mrs. Annie Terry were past middle age, and it was in evidence that defendant said to one W. B. Cheek, in a conversation about March 1st, that he was going to get married. It was in evidence that he told Sheriff G. W. Blair he was going to get married. "He gave me the lady's name and address at Cooleemee; that he finished the letter about 9 P. M. That he didn't want the lady's name in it, and that he was engaged to her." He wrote her the night of March 24th. The defendant's motive was to get rid of this "old glove" and marry the Cooleemee fiancé.

(3) Identity of Defendant as the One Who Committed the Crime, and Contradictory Statements.--The Lawrence home place, owned by defendant's father, who is dead, and now owned by the heirs, is located about a mile and a half east of Avent's Ferry bridge, and the heirs own the land on the Chatham county side of the river to the bridge. The water in the river where Mrs. Annie Terry was thrown in is some 18 to 20 feet deep. Defendant was raised at the old Lawrence home place. The state contends that it is reasonable to infer that defendant in his boyhood days hunted along the river bottom and fished and boated in the river, knew its depth, and was familiar with the surroundings. The piers and bridge were finished the fall previous. Defendant was at Brick Haven some 2...