State v. Sommers

• Decision Date: 07 June 1909
• Citation: 73 A. 49
• Parties: STATE v. SOMMERS.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

73 A. 49

STATE

v. SOMMERS.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

June 7, 1909.

Error to Court of Oyer and Terminer, Hudson County.

John Sommers was convicted of assault and battery, and he brings error. Affirmed.

Argued February term, 1909, before the CHIEF JUSTICE and SWAYZE and PARKER, JJ.

Alexander Simpson, for plaintiff in error.

Pierre P. Garven, for the State.

SWAYZE, J. The defendant was indicted for murder, and convicted of assault and battery. His defense was self-defense. His own account of the occurrence is that his companion, Schmeiss, had quite a talk with Dobbins, the deceased; that the woman in whose company Dobbins was had gone away, and that when he, the defendant, pushed his head in to see what was the trouble, Dobbins punched him in the jaw, and as he was starting back Schmeiss said, "Look out, Jack; he has got a knife;" that he saw the knife in the hand of the deceased, and backed off a step or two; that the deceased came toward him, and he struck the deceased somewhere in the face. There was no other testimony in the case of any justification. The defendant said that he was afraid the deceased would get after him and his companion, and stick one of them with the knife. The court was requested to charge that the right of self-defense may arise from circumstances that justify a reasonable apprehension of great bodily harm, and that the defendant may have been in no actual peril, yet he would have the right, if he had a reasonable apprehension of great bodily harm, to strike the blow he did in defense of himself. The trial judge charged that if the deceased had struck the defendant, and then advanced upon him again with the uplifted hand with the knife in it ready to strike again, the defendant was clearly within his rights in defending himself with such force as was necessary to protect him from great bodily injury, or what he apprehended reasonably to be a dangerous situation; that the burden was upon the defendant to satisfy the jury that the circumstances were such at the time he struck the blow that he was in reasonable apprehension of danger. He then added: "The circumstances must be such as to satisfy you that the defendant had reasonable grounds to believe he was in danger of life or limb." This was an inadequate statement of the law of self-defense. It omits the situation which arises when the force offered is not so great as to involve peril of life or limb, where the defendant may use such force as is reasonably necessary...