State v. Wade
| Decision Date | 26 August 1913 |
| Citation | 95 S. C. 387,79 S.E. 106 |
| Parties | STATE. v. WADE et al. |
| Court | South Carolina Supreme Court |
Appeal from General Sessions Circuit Court of Greenville County; J. W. De Vore, Judge.
B. G. Wade and another were convicted of fornication, and they appeal. Reversed.
John C. Henry and J. Robert Martin, both of Greenville, for appellants.
P. A. Bonham, of Greenville, for the State.
HYDRICK, J. [1] The appellants were tried, in their absence, for fornication. With the exception of certain admissions of the defendant Meta Wade, proved by the deputy sheriff who executed the warrant of arrest, the evidence was wholly circumstantial. Stated most strongly against the defendants, the substance of it was that B. G. Wade was a widower whose family consisted of a son and two daughters. At the time of the trial, the son was 19, and the daughters were 13 and 14 years old, respectively. He had also an older son, who was the husband of the defendant Meta. Some years ago—possibly from three to five, though the testimony does not disclose the date even approximately— Meta and her husband moved into the home of B. G. Wade, and lived with him, as members of his family. Some time after that (another period not fixed by the evidence) Meta's husband died, and she continued to live in the house of her father-in-law, as a member of his family. After the death of her husband she gave birth to two children. One died shortly after its birth. The other was about two years old at the time of the trial. Meta's statement to the deputy sheriff was to the effect that for several years she had been wanting to leave B. G. Wade, and go back to her father's, but that she could not do so, because he would not let her go, and that if he (the officer) would keep Wade off her, until she could get away, she would leave him and go to her father's. She admitted that she had slept in the bed with her codefendant, and said she knew the officer had a warrant for them for living in adultery. She showed him a bleeding cancer on her breast, and told him that Wade had come home drunk, and beat her nearly to death, and stamped her in the breast.
The court instructed the jury that, if they could not come to any other reasonable conclusion, from the facts and circumstances in evidence, than that the defendants were guilty, they would be justified in so finding, but that, if they could just as reasonably conclude that they were innocent as that they were guilty, they would not be warranted in convicting them; that they were entitled to the benefit of every reasonable doubt; that the admissions of Meta could not be considered as evidence against B. G. Wade; and that they must acquit...
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