State v. Lunsford
Decision Date | 22 September 1948 |
Docket Number | 75 |
Citation | 49 S.E.2d 410,229 N.C. 229 |
Parties | STATE v. LUNSFORD. |
Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
The defendants were charged with robbery.
It was made to appear at the trial by the evidence of the State and that of the defendants that the defendants met the prosecuting witness, Jack Maney, for the first time at the Amos and Andy Cafe on the Weaverville highway in Buncombe County about four o'clock on the afternoon of Saturday July 10, 1948; that Maney was armed with a pistol; that the defendant Lunsford seized and held Maney while the defendant Sawyer took the pistol from him; that Sawyer then delivered the pistol to Lunsford, who carried it away against the wishes of Maney; that Lunsford was arrested at his home on the following day on the charge of robbing Maney of the pistol; and that Lunsford then and there surrendered the pistol to the arresting officers.
The testimony of the State and that of the defendants diverged radically, however, with respect to the events preceding and accompanying the taking of the pistol. The State's sole evidence on this phase of the case came from the prosecuting witness Maney. He said:
The other version of the affair was given by the defendants and their witness, Waldo Davis. The defendant Lunsford testified as follows: The testimony of the defendant Sawyer and the witness Davis coincided with that of Lunsford. Sawyer expressly stated that he took the pistol from Maney 'for the sole purpose of preventing him from shooting Paris Lunsford.'
The jury found both of the defendants guilty of robbery 'as charged in the bill of indictment. ' From judgment based on this verdict, the defendants appealed, assigning errors.
Harry M. McMullan, Atty. Gen., and T. W. Bruton, Hughes J. Rhodes and Ralph M. Moody, Asst. Attys. Gen., for the State.
Don C Young, of Asheville, for defendants, appellants.
The defendants emphasize their exceptions to the charge. They insist, among other things, that the trial judge erred in failing to instuct the jury as to the felonious intent essential to the crime of robbery, and in restricting the...
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