Lynn v. State

79 S.E. 29, 140 Ga. 387, 1913 Ga. LEXIS 142
CourtSupreme Court of Georgia
DecidedJune 13, 1913
StatusPublished
Cited by34 cases

This text of 79 S.E. 29 (Lynn 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
Lynn v. State, 79 S.E. 29, 140 Ga. 387, 1913 Ga. LEXIS 142 (Ga. 1913).

Opinion

Hill, J.

At tbe January term, 1913, of the superior court of Laurens county, A. L. Lynn and Alice Lynn, his wife, were jointly indicted and tried for the murder of F. M. Hightower.. The jury rendered a verdict finding the defendant Alice Lynn not guilty, and the defendant A. L. Lynn guilty, with a recommendation of life imprisonment in the penitentiary. To the judgment of the court overruling his motion for a new trial A. L. Lynn excepted.

1.. One ground 6f the amended motion for a new trial is because the court erred in sustaining a demurrer filed to the challenge to the array, of grand jurors before they had returned a true bill against the defendants. The grand jury by whom the defendant was indicted was drawn at the regular fall term of court, and summoned to appear at the next term, to wit, the January term, when they were impaneled. At that term the defendant was indicted. He challenged the array on the ground that the grand jury was not a legal one. He contended that the provision of the act creating the Dublin circuit (Acts 1911, p. 82), which provides that the grand juries of the counties of that circuit “shall [389]*389not be convened except for the spring and fall terms of the court, unless in the discretion of the presiding judge it shall be deemed expedient to call a special session of the grand jury at some other term,” was unconstitutional because not uniform with the practice in regard to summoning grand juries for each term of court prescribed by general laws, and also because the grand jury were not called in special session at the January term of court in accordance with that act, if it were constitutional. It is unnecessary to decide whether the provision of the act above quoted is or is not constitutional. In either event, the grand jury which indicted the defendant was a legal grand jury, and that is all that concerns him. Under the general law provision is made for having a grand jury at each term of court. Penal Code, § 823. If, therefore, the above-quoted provision is invalid and should be stricken from the act, under the general law a grand jury could be drawn at the fall term of court and summoned for the next regular term thereafter, to wit, the January term. If, on the other hand, the provision of the act above quoted should be held to be constitutional, there is nothing in it which would make the grand jury so drawn and summoned an illegal grand jury. It declares that the grand juries shall not be “convened” except for the spring and fall terms of the court, unless' in the discretion of the court it shall be deemed expedient “to call a special session of the grand jury at some other term.” When the presiding judge drew a grand jury at the fall term of court and caused the jurors so drawn to be summoned to appear at the January term thereafter, and impaneled them and caused them to proceed to discharge the duties of a grand jury, this was sufficient evidence that in his discretion he deemed it necessary for the grand jury to be in session at that term, and that he called a special session of the grand jury thereat. No formal order or declaration further than this was necessary for that purpose. The act requires the grand jury to be convened at the spring and fall terms of the court, and leaves it to the discretion of the presiding judge to call a special session of the grand jury at some other term. It was held in Tompkins v. State, 138 Ga. 465 (75 S. E. 594), that grand jurors who had served at one regular term of the superior court were declared by the legislature to be ineligible for jury duty at the next succeeding term, and that under the act creating the Dublin circuit the presiding judge could not summon [390]*390a grand jury which had served at one regular term to serve at the next succeeding regular term of court. It was suggested that probably, under the power to call a special Session of the grand jury at some other term, the same grand jury might be recalled at such a term as grand juries could be called in special session under the general law; but what was said in regard to calling back a grand jury to serve at two succeeding terms was not a construction of the entire provision of the act, or a declaration that it had no meaning except in regard to such a situation. In the present case there was no effort to require a grand jury which had served at one term to return and serve at the next succeeding regular term. A new grand jury was drawn at the fall term and summoned to serve at the January term, and then impaneled. As to that situation, the action of the judge was a sufficient compliance with the provision of the act authorizing him to call a special session of the grand jury at the January term. Thus, if the constitutional attack on this provision of the act should be sustained, under the general law the grand jury which indicted the defendant was legally drawn, summoned, and impaneled at the term when the indictment was found. If the provision of the act should be treated as valid, what was done was a sufficient compliance with its terms, and the grand jury was a legal grand jury. This being so, in either event the court properly refused to sustain the challenge to the array and the plea in abatement which raised the same question.

2. After arraignment, a panel of forty-eight traverse jurors was put upon the defendants, A. L. Lynn and Alice Lynn, and a list of the names of the forty-eight jurors was furnished them, and the court ordered the striking of the jury from the list so furnished. The defendants objected to the ruling of the court that they strike from the list of forty-eight jurors, and demanded a panel of ninety-six jurors to be furnished them before being compelled to commence their strikes. The defendant assigns error on the refusal of the court to furnish a panel of ninety-six jurors, insisting that as there were two defendants on trial jointly, each defendant was (as the court held), entitled to twenty peremptory strikes; and, as the defendants were jointly indicted and jointly on trial, that they were entitled to a panel of ninety-six jurors from which to commence striking, so that each might have his or her twenty peremptory challenges with knowledge of the personnel of [391]*391the entire panel of ninety-six. At common law, the-preparation of a list of those liable to be summoned to serve as jurors at a succeeding term of court was unknown. The sheriff, coroner, or officials known as elisors had an uncontrolled discretion to summon such “good and lawful men” as they might select, by virtue of a writ of venire facias. This practice was said to have led to abuses, mainly in “packing juries,” and blackmailing citizens. 1 Thompson on Trials, § 13. To prevent a recurrence of this evil, statutes have been passed in nearly if not all American States, providing for the drawing from the jury-box, previously prepared by officials designated for that purpose under fixed rules, at “a given time before the commencement of any term of court, or at other stated periods, of a list of persons, within the county or other jurisdiction, from whom jurors are to be summoned.” Id. Thus our Penal Code, § 862, provides how a jury is impaneled to try a person indicted for a felony: “When any person shall stand indicted for a felony, the court shall have impaneled forty-eight jurors, twenty-four of whom shall be taken from the two panels of petit jurors, from which to select the jury. If the jury can not be made up of said panel of forty-eight, the court shall continue to furnish panels, consisting of such number of jurors as the court, in its discretion, may think proper, until a jury is obtained.” • And see § 863.

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

Related

Thomas v. State
655 S.E.2d 599 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 2008)
Catchings v. State
347 S.E.2d 572 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1986)
Hudson v. State
295 S.E.2d 123 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1982)
Singleton v. State
280 S.E.2d 407 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1981)
Goodwin v. State
267 S.E.2d 488 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1980)
Barron v. Pacific Employers Insurance
253 S.E.2d 777 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1979)
Scott v. State
253 S.E.2d 401 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1979)
Leach v. State
239 S.E.2d 177 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1977)
Coffee v. State
195 S.E.2d 897 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1973)
Horton v. Ammons
186 S.E.2d 469 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1971)
Golden v. Credico, Inc.
185 S.E.2d 578 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1971)
Joiner v. Joiner
171 S.E.2d 297 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1969)
Taylor v. Marsh
130 S.E.2d 770 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1963)
Chappell v. State
75 S.E.2d 417 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1953)
Jones v. State
28 S.E.2d 373 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1943)
Lewis v. State
27 S.E.2d 659 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1943)
Kines v. State
20 S.E.2d 89 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1942)
Heath v. City of Atlanta
19 S.E.2d 746 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1942)
Beckworth v. State
190 S.E. 184 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1937)
Simmons v. State
184 S.E. 291 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1936)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
79 S.E. 29, 140 Ga. 387, 1913 Ga. LEXIS 142, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lynn-v-state-ga-1913.