Turner v. State

• Decision Date: 11 March 1913
• Citation: 77 S.E. 828,139 Ga. 593
• Parties: TURNER et al. v. STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

77 S.E. 828

139 Ga. 593

TURNER et al. v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Georgia

March 11, 1913

Syllabus by the Court.

In the absence of a proper written request, it is not cause for a new trial that the court failed to instruct the jury upon the rule of law respecting the credibility of witnesses. Lewis v. State, 125 Ga. 48, 53 S.E. 816; Lewis v. State, 129 Ga. 731, 59 S.E. 782.

The court charged the jury on the subject of their duty to acquit the defendants, or such of them as to whom the evidence failed to show guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, as clearly and as distinctly as was stated in the written request. Where the court has fairly and fully instructed the jury on a given subject, it is not error to deny requests to charge on that subject, varying from the charge only in the mode of expression, and not in substance. Perdue v. State, 126 Ga. 112, 54 S.E. 820.

It was not error to give the following charge: "I charge you in this connection that, where a homicide is shown to have been committed, the law presumes that the homicide was malicious, and it devolves on the defendant to show justification, or mitigation, or excuse, unless the evidence adduced against him shows such justification, or mitigation, or excuse, or unless the circumstances connected with the homicide, if a homicide is shown to have been committed, shows justification, or mitigation, or excuse." Mann v. State, 124 Ga. 760, 53 S.E. 324, 4 L.R.A. (N. S.) 934.

The evidence was sufficient to show concert of action with the actual slayer, who was jointly tried with the plaintiffs in error, and that the homicide was murder. The court did not abuse its discretion in refusing a new trial.

Error from Superior Court, Morgan County; Jas. B. Park, Judge.

Hal Turner and others were convicted of homicide, and bring error. Affirmed.

Middlebrooks & Burrus and Williford & Lambert, all of Madison, for plaintiffs in error.

Jos. E. Pottle, Sol. Gen., of Milledgeville, and T. S. Felder, Atty. Gen., for the State.

EVANS, P.J.

Judgment affirmed. All the Justices concur, except BECK, J., absent on account of sickness.