Stevens v. The State Of Ga.

• Citation: 77 Ga. 310
• Parties: Stevens. vs. The State of Georgia.
• Decision Date: 31 October 1886
• Court: Supreme Court of Georgia

77 Ga. 310

Stevens. vs. The State of Georgia.

Supreme Court of the State of Georgia

OCTOBER TERM, 1886.

Criminal Law. Evidence. Before Judge John T. Clarke. Early Superior Court. April Term, 1886.

Alex. Stevens was indicted for the larceny of a black sow-hog, the property of D. P. Rowland. On the trial, the evidence for the State was, in brief, as follows: The hog was a pet, and was in the habit of going up to the house and did not run away. It was missed from the owner's lot on Sunday, and he suspected the defendant, who lived about three hundred yards away. In company with two others, he went to the defendant's house, looking for his hog as a stolen hog. He asked the defendant to permit him to search the house, but the latter declined, saying he would not permit his house to be searched for foolishness. The owner went to town to obtain a search warrant. After he was gone, the defendant said he, too, was going to town to see if the owner had a right to a warrant. He did not return. On searching the premises, some hog bones were found in the house, hog hair and entrails were found buried in one hole in the garden and fresh meat in another. The meat corresponded in size and the hair in color with those of the missing hog. The defendant was found and arrested several years afterwards at a point more than fifty miles away.

The defendant introduced no evidence. The jury found him guilty. He moved for a new trial on the ground that the verdict was contrary to law, evidence and the charge of the court; and because the court permitted a witness for the State to testify that the owner was hunting for the hog as a stolen hog, over objection of defendant.

The motion was overruled, and he excepted.

R. H. Powell, by brief, for plaintiff in error.

J. H. Guerry, solicitor-general, by J. H. Lumpkin, for the State.

Bleckley, Chief Justice.

1. In the house hog bones, in the garden hog hair, hog entrails, hog meat, buried in the earth, refusal of the occupant of the premises to permit a search without legal warrant, his abrupt departure from home whilst the warrant was being procured, his flight or retreat to a point more than fifty miles distant, and his continuous absence until arrested and brought back for trial, are strongly suggestive of a suspicious intercourse on his part with some hog or other. The jury were of opinion that it was the hog described in the indictment; and as he was a near neighbor to that hog, and as it disappeared about that time and its owner...