Ward v. State, 57815
| Decision Date | 03 October 1979 |
| Docket Number | No. 57815,57815 |
| Citation | 151 Ga.App. 36,258 S.E.2d 699 |
| Parties | WARD v. The STATE. |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
Archer, Elsey & Vaughan, David N. Vaughan, Jr., Stanley D. Tilley, Cartersville, Cook & Palmour, Bobby Lee Cook, Summerville, for appellant.
Charles Crawford, Dist. Atty., for appellee.
Appellant, Queen Ward, was indicted for murder and convicted of voluntary manslaughter. On appeal she brings five enumerations of error. We affirm.
On the night of August 10, 1978 Ward and Troy Carter, a friend for several years, went to a restaurant in a boarding house which Ward helped to operate. Ward's husband had died a year earlier and she asked Carter to accompany her as she would be returning late at night and she did not want to drive alone. During the course of the evening Carter asked Ward several times to leave and return to Cartersville, indicating he had to go to work at 6:00 A.M. the next morning. She stated she would go when she was finished working and Carter, who had been drinking, became angry. He went out of the restaurant once, returned and asked Ward again to go. She was not ready and Carter became loud and abusive to Ward. Finally, after calling her several obscene names, he got the keys to her car and said he would wait for her in the car. Around 1:00 A.M. Ward went outside where another argument ensued and Carter was fatally shot. The evidence is conflicting as to the immediate circumstances of the shooting. Ward insisted that she was knocked down by Carter and thought he was going to choke her which caused her to take a .22 caliber pistol out of her purse and shoot him. Other testimony sought to establish that she was not in immediate danger when she fired the shot.
1. In Enumerations 1 and 2 appellant contends that the trial court erred in instructing the jury that there was an option of finding her guilty of voluntary manslaughter, and if the jury found she was not guilty of murder it should then determine whether she was guilty of voluntary manslaughter.
Code Ann. § 26-1102 provides that "A person commits voluntary manslaughter when he causes the death of another human being, under circumstances which would otherwise be murder, if he acts solely as the result of a sudden, violent, and irresistible passion resulting from serious provocation sufficient to excite such passion in a reasonable person; . . ." Our Supreme Court has held that a trial judge "may, of his own volition and in his discretion, charge on a lesser crime of that included in the indictment or accusation." State v. Stonaker, 236 Ga. 1, 2, 222 S.E.2d 354, 356 (1976) " n a homicide is neither justifiable nor malicious, it is manslaughter, and if intentional, it is voluntary manslaughter." Starr v. State, 134 Ga.App. 149, 213 S.E.2d 531 (1975). Reynolds v. State, 131 Ga.App. 247, 205 S.E.2d 536 (1974). "On the trial of a murder case if there is any evidence to create a doubt, however slight, as to whether the offense is murder or voluntary manslaughter, instructions as to the law of both offenses should be given." Gresham v. State, 216 Ga. 106(2), 115 S.E.2d 191 (1960); Fuller v. State, 138 Ga.App. 241, 242, 225 S.E.2d 718 (1976). Under the circumstances of this case, it was not error for the trial court to instruct on voluntary manslaughter.
2. The trial court clearly charged the jury that it should acquit Ward if it found the homicide to be justifiable and there is no merit to the contentions asserted in Enumeration 2.
3. In Enumeration 3, Ward contends that the trial court erred in failing to instruct on the offense of involuntary manslaughter. Ward admitted that she shot the victim. This, of course, raises a presumption that she intended to kill him. See generally Moon v. State, 68 Ga....
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Daniels v. State
...Under the circumstances of this case, it was not error for the trial court to instruct on voluntary manslaughter." Ward v. State, 151 Ga.App. 36(1), 258 S.E.2d 699 (1979); Jones v. State, 71 Ga.App. 56, 30 S.E.2d 284 3. Daniels contends that the trial court committed reversible error by ref......
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Lightsey v. State
..." Ballard v. State, 150 Ga.App. 704 (2), 258 S.E.2d 331; Accord: Cochran v. State, 146 Ga.App. 414, 415, 246 S.E.2d 431; Ward v. State, 151 Ga.App. 36, 258 S.E.2d 699. The sufficiency of the provocation and cooling time are questions for the jury. Reynolds v. State, 131 Ga.App. 247, 205 S.E......
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Holmes v. State, 64128
...whether the offense is murder or voluntary manslaughter, instructions as to the law of both offenses should be given." Ward v. State, 151 Ga.App. 36(1), 258 S.E.2d 699. Accord, Linder v. State, 132 Ga.App. 624(1), 208 S.E.2d 630; Birdsong v. State, 140 Ga.App. 719, 231 S.E.2d 813; Powell v.......
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Daniels v. State
...of both offenses should be given." (Emphasis supplied.) Gresham v. State, 216 Ga. 106, 108, 115 S.E.2d 191 (1960); Ward v. State, 151 Ga.App. 36(1), 258 S.E.2d 699 (1979). In the case sub judice, the trial judge properly exercised his discretion in giving the charge of his own volition. We ......