Cooper v. State

184 S.E. 716, 182 Ga. 42, 104 A.L.R. 1309, 1936 Ga. LEXIS 281
CourtSupreme Court of Georgia
DecidedFebruary 18, 1936
DocketNo. 10853
StatusPublished
Cited by54 cases

This text of 184 S.E. 716 (Cooper v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Cooper v. State, 184 S.E. 716, 182 Ga. 42, 104 A.L.R. 1309, 1936 Ga. LEXIS 281 (Ga. 1936).

Opinion

Atkinson, Justice.

James T. Cbappell was employed in the plant of a business enterprise located on the east side of West Peachtree Street in Atlanta, slightly north of the intersection of Third Street. At the southwest corner of those streets was a grocery-store, adjoining which on the south was a drug-store, both' facing West Peachtree Street. At the edge of the sidewalk in front of the grocery store was a letter-box. About six o’clock in the evening of November 4, 1932, Chappell at the close of business walked across the streets for the purpose of obtaining a newspaper at the drug-store and mailing some letters, intending to return to his automobile -in which his wife was waiting on the east side of West Peachtree Street between the place of business and Third Street, and to go to his home. At the letter-box he came in contact with a stranger, and both men were seen standing in front of the grocery store and near the letter-box engaged in conversation. Mrs. Chappell several times sounded the automobile horn as' signals for Chappell to come. As he was in the act of leaving for his automobile the other man shot him with a pistol and fled west [44]*44on- Third Street to a waiting automobile which he entered and passed out of sight, continuing west along Third Street. Chappell fell on the sidewalk and immediately afterwards when his wife reached him,- exclaimed: ‘‘A man has held me up ! I have been shot! Call Jack Loyless . . [the superintendent of the plant] and the police, and take me to the hospital. . . I can not feel in my leg.” Just before the shot was fired Chappell, in an apparent condition of restraint, was seen by a person passing him and the man, and was heard to say to the man: “I don’t know anything about it.” Chappell was carried to the Crawford Long Hospital. On November 7, a police officer exhibited several photographs to him, one of which he declared to he a photograph of the person who shot him. The picture was known by the officer to be a photograph of Charles M. Cooper. The bullet entered the body just below the left armpit, passed through the lung and the spinal cord, immediately producing paralysis of the limbs and whole body below the middle of the stomach. After detention at the hospital for ten weeks he was carried to his home, still in his paralyzed condition, where he remained about eight and a half months. His condition becoming worse, he was removed to the Georgia Baptist Hospital on October 1, 1933, where he was retained four days and then sent back to his home in a hopeless condition, where he lingered until he died on October 9, 1933, from the effects of the wound. Cooper was arrested in January, 1934, the officers having made search for him from the day of his identification by photograph as above stated. An indictment was returned on January 26, 1934, against Charles M. Cooper, alias Charles Stanton, charging him .with the murder. He was tried and convicted on April 26, 1934, and a new trial was granted by the trial court. On his second trial he introduced evidence tending to show an alibi by reason of his absence from Atlanta and his presence in the City of Miami, Florida (a distance of more than 700 miles, and running time 14 hours by automobile) on the 2d and 3d and morning of the 4th day of November, prior to the shooting on the evening of November 4th. As to his presence in Miami on the 3d and the'morning of the 4th of November, there was conflict in the testimony of his witnesses. He also made a statement before the jury, in which he declared his continuous absence from Atlanta from June 13, 1932, to November 29 or 30, 1932, being first in Tampa, Florida, and then in Miami, [45]*45Florida. The State introduced evidence tending to prove its case as hereinbefore outlined, and to identify the defendant as present in Atlanta and as the actual perpetrator of the crime, thus combating the defense of alibi. On November 10, 1934, the jury returned a verdict finding the defendant guilty, without any recommendation, and he was sentenced to be electrocuted. He made a motion for a new trial, which was overruled, and he excepted.

Three days after the wound was inflicted upon Chappell, and eleven months before his death, a police officer exhibited to him, while in the Crawford W. Long Hospital, certain photographs from which he identified one “as being a picture of the person who shot him.” As a witness for the State the officer gave testimony as above, and identified the picture as a picture of the defendant, “taken by our identification bureau.” Prior to the offering of this testimony, the wife of Chappell had testified, that “several days” before he died her husband, after the doctor had told him he could not get well, talked to her about his condition, “and said he knew he was going to die.” And he said what brought about his condition “was a bandit held him up and shot him. . . That when they got the man whose picture he had identified in the hospital they would have the man who shot him.” The testimony of the officer was admitted in evidence over the objection that the declaration to the officer “was not admissible as a dying declaration, because said alleged declarations of the deceased were made, if made, more than eleven months before the death of the deceased, and were not admissible as dying declarations, and were not admissible as a part of the res gestse, because said declarations, if made, were made about three days after the deceased was shot, and that said alleged declarations were not admissible because they were only hearsay evidence.”

In admitting the evidence the judge stated to the jury: “I permit this testimony to go to the jury, and will instruct you fully about it when I come to deliver the charge in this ease.” The only instruction given to the jury in reference to the evidence was as follows: “The State contends in this case, which the defendant denies, that the deceased, just before his death and while in the article of death and being then conscious of his hopeless condition, made what the law defines as a dying declaration as to the cause of his death and the person who killed him, What the truth of [46]*46this contention is would be for you to determine from the testimony in this case and the defendant’s statement. A rule of law of this State is that dying declarations made by any person in the article of death, who is then conscious of his condition, as to the cause of his death and person who killed him, are admissible in evidence in a prosecution for the homicide. Whether a deceased did so or not, whether he made such dying declaration or not, whether it was made just before his death, and whether the deceased was then in the article of death, and whether he was then conscious of his condition, are all questions for the jury to determine from the evidence in the case and the defendant’s statement,' the jury being also the judges of the credibility of the deceased and whether or not such statement, if made, was true. To render admissible in evidence any statement as a dying declaration made by any person as to the cause of his death and the person who killed him, the law provides that it is necessary that the jury should believe beyond a reasonable doubt that such alleged declaration was made, if made, while the deceased was in the article of death and that he was then conscious that he was in the article of death and of his hopeless condition, though not necessarily immediately before his death.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Biggins v. State
494 S.E.2d 45 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1997)
Sapp v. State
474 S.E.2d 233 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1996)
Farley v. State
458 S.E.2d 643 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1995)
Davis v. State
393 S.E.2d 260 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1990)
Dean v. State
293 S.E.2d 492 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1982)
Sweat v. State
288 S.E.2d 865 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1982)
Clark v. State
287 S.E.2d 523 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1982)
Clark v. State
282 S.E.2d 752 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1981)
Atcheson v. State
220 S.E.2d 483 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1975)
Hilton v. State
209 S.E.2d 606 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1974)
Wanzer v. State
207 S.E.2d 466 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1974)
State v. Jackson
200 S.E.2d 626 (Supreme Court of North Carolina, 1973)
Thomas v. State
197 S.E.2d 452 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1973)
Tanner v. State
188 S.E.2d 512 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1972)
State v. Hatcher
177 S.E.2d 892 (Supreme Court of North Carolina, 1970)
Willis v. State
178 S.E.2d 737 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1970)
Stocks v. State
168 S.E.2d 893 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1969)
United States v. Plaut
18 C.M.A. 265 (United States Court of Military Appeals, 1969)
Commonwealth v. McLellan
220 N.E.2d 819 (Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, 1966)
Moore v. State
146 S.E.2d 895 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1966)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
184 S.E. 716, 182 Ga. 42, 104 A.L.R. 1309, 1936 Ga. LEXIS 281, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/cooper-v-state-ga-1936.