State v. Lefevers
| Decision Date | 22 November 1939 |
| Docket Number | 289. |
| Citation | 5 S.E.2d 552,216 N.C. 494 |
| Parties | STATE v. LEFEVERS et al. |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
The defendants were convicted of an assault with a deadly weapon to wit: a knife, upon one C. A. Mull.
The State's evidence tended to show that the four defendants together with C. A. Mull and his wife, were riding in an automobile driven by Andrew Lefevers; that Mull and his wife and one Fred Shuping were riding on the front seat with the driver, and that the defendants Duckworth, Bowman and Newland Lefevers, with Bill Branch, were riding on the back seat that Andrew Lefevers took his foot off of the accelerator and laid his arm around Mull and said "I've got the s. o. b., kill him," and immediately Harry Bowman cut the prosecuting witness about the neck and ear, and that Bruce Duckworth struck him over the head, that Newland Lefevers had a black jack and when the wife of Mull screamed he told her to "shut her damn mouth" that he was going to kill her husband.
The defendants' evidence tended to show that C. A. Mull took offense at Harry Bowman's speaking of Mull's brother as a "weasel face man", and attacked Bowman with his knife cutting his shirt just over the heart, and that Bowman cut Mull in self-defense; and that none of the other defendants aided or abetted Bowman in doing what he did in cutting Mull.
The jury returned a verdict of guilty of an assault with a deadly weapon as to all four of the defendants, and from judgments of imprisonment, the defendants appealed, assigning errors.
Hatcher & Berry and I. T. Avery, all of Morganton, for defendants, appellants.
Harry McMullan, Atty. Gen., and T. W. Bruton and Geo. B. Patton, Asst. Attys. Gen., for the State.
While the evidence was conflicting and may have justified an acquittal, when taken in the light most favorable to the State it sustains the verdict, and for that reason the defendants' motions to dismiss the action under C.S.§ 4643, were properly denied.
The defendant Bruce Duckworth assigns as error the testimony of the witness C. A. Mull, that This assignment is untenable for the reason that the testimony was competent for the purpose, if no other, of showing motive, which though not always necessary to be shown is always competent to be shown in the trial of a criminal action. State v. Wilkins, 158 N.C. 603, 73 S.E. 992. The statement "he was making liquors" was not responsive to the question propounded, and the defendant, if he deemed it prejudicial, should have requested the Court to strike it from the record and to instruct the jury not to consider it. State v. Green, 152 N.C. 835, 68...
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State v. Williams, 45
...retire and consider the matter further, reason with each other as intelligent men, and come to an agreement.' . . . In State v. Lefevers, 216 N.C. 494, 5 S.E.2d 552, the Court found no error in this portion of the trial judge's . . . (I)t is your duty to decide it because it is an expense t......
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State v. Palmer
... ... Lefevers, 216 N.C. 494, 5 S.E.2d 552; State v ... Wilkins, 158 N.C. 603, 73 S.E. 992; State v ... Green, 92 N.C. 779. But such evidence, standing alone, ... is not sufficient to carry a case to the jury, or to sustain ... a conviction. 23 C.J.S., Criminal Law, s 1139; 44 C.J.S., ... Homicide, s ... ...
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State v. Bailey
...court intimated what the verdict should be. Instructions of similar import have been upheld in many cases, including State v. Lefevers, 216 N.C. 494, 5 S.E.2d 552 (1939); State v. Pugh, 183 N.C. 800, 111 S.E. 849 (1922); State v. Brodie, 190 N.C. 554, 130 S.E. 205 (1925); In re Will of Hall......
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State v. Mays
... ... fact. The question was proper and there was no objection to ... the answer or motion to strike the part thereof which ... undertook to give the means used. Defendant waived any ... grounds for objection to so much of the answer as may not be ... responsive to the question. State v. Lefevers, 216 ... N.C. 494, 5 S.E.2d 730; State v. Gooding, 196 N.C ... 710, 146 S.E. 806; Luttrell v. Hardin, 193 N.C. 266, ... 136 S.E. 726 ... The ... confession was prima facie voluntary and admissible in ... evidence. State v. Grass, 223 N.C. 31, 25 S.E.2d ... 193; State v ... ...