State v. Runyon
| Decision Date | 05 June 1919 |
| Citation | 107 A. 33 |
| Parties | STATE v. RUNYON. |
| Court | New Jersey Supreme Court |
Error to Court of Quarter Sessions, Union County.
Charles B. Runyon was convicted of assault and battery, and he brings error. Affirmed.
Argued February term, 1919, before GUMMERE, C. J., and SWAYZE and TRENOHARD, JJ.
William R. Wilson, of Elizabeth, for plaintiff in error.
Walter L. Hetfield, Jr., Prosecutor of the Pleas, of Plainfield, for the State.
The plaintiff in error was convicted of an atrocious assault and battery committed on one Robert Alpaugh, the night ticket agent of the Central Railroad Company of New Jersey, at its office in Westfield.
The first ground of reversal urged before us is that there was not sufficient evidence to justify this conviction. It has been repeatedly held by this court that it will not consider a ground of reversal which challenges the sufficiency of the testimony. It is only where the contention is that there is no evidence whatever to support the verdict that the court will examine the testimony, and then only for the purpose of ascertaining whether such contention is well founded.
Next it is argued that there was error in the refusal of the court to charge a request submitted by the defendant bearing on the question of reasonable doubt. This contention is without merit. The court did not refuse to charge the request, but, on the contrary, after reading it to the jury, stated that it was a mere repetition of what had already been charged. The accuracy of this judicial statement was not challenged by the plaintiff in error, and our examination of the instruction to the jury satisfies us that it was accurate.
The next contention is that the court erred in the following portion of its instruction to the jury:
"The jury may consider, among other things, in ascertaining the truth, the demeanor of a witness, his manner of testifying, his appearance, mental capacity, power of observation, closeness of attention, the probability of his statements, and their inconsistencies and contradictions, and all other things that may be inferred from experience, or which the jury may deem proper under the circumstances."
The objection is directed at the last clause of this instruction. Its meaning, as it seems to us, is that the jury had a right to use their own experience in the consideration of the credit to be given to the testimony of a witness; that they might consider, not only the matters specifically mentioned, but other...
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