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Shelton v. State

140 S.E.2d 839, 220 Ga. 610, 1965 Ga. LEXIS 571
CourtSupreme Court of Georgia
DecidedFebruary 4, 1965
Docket22767
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 140 S.E.2d 839 (Shelton 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
Shelton v. State, 140 S.E.2d 839, 220 Ga. 610, 1965 Ga. LEXIS 571 (Ga. 1965).

Opinion

Quillian, Justice.

The Court of Appeals has certified to this court a question of law as follows: “Where the trial court, at the request of the defendant, has invoked the rule of sequestration of witnesses and required that all witnesses be examined out of the hearing of each other (Code § 38-1703), and the defendant thereafter seeks to call as a witness a person who has remained in the courtroom as a spectator, is the testimony of such witness admissible over the objection of the State?”

The question is answered in the affirmative. Rooks v. State, 65 Ga. 330; Lassiter v. State, 67 Ga. 739; May v. State, 90 Ga. 793, 800 (17 SE 108); McWhorter v. State, 118 Ga. 55 (6) (44 SE 873); Phillips v. State, 121 Ga. 358 (3) (49 SE 290); Wallace v. Mize, 153 Ga. 374, 388 (112 SE 724); Best v. State, 176 Ga. 46, 48 (166 SE 772); McCartney v. McCartney, 217 Ga. 200 (7) (121 SE2d 785); Thomas v. State, 7 Ga. App. 615 (67 SE 707); Edwards v. State, 55 Ga. App. 187 (1) (189 SE 678). Art. I, Sec. I, Par. Y of the Georgia Constitution and the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The pronouncements of Etheridge v. Hobbs, 77 Ga. 531, 534 (3 SE 251), Pergason v. Etcherson, 91 Ga. 785 (3) (18 SE 29), and Cunningham v. State, 97 Ga. 214 (22 SE 954), some of which deal with the consequences of a witness wilfully disobeying the order of sequestration and others with waiver of the right to use a witness under stated circumstances, do not require a contrary conclusion from that we have expressed in giving an affirmative answer to the question. In so far as Bird v. State, 50 Ga. 585, 588, is in conflict with what is ruled here, the same is unsound and is overruled.

Certified question answered in the affirmative.

All the Justices concur. *611 Wesley Asinof, Chester E. Wallace, F. L. Breen, for plaintiff in error. William T. Boyd, Solicitor General, J. Robert Sparks, J. Walter LeCraw, William Hall, Jr., contra.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
140 S.E.2d 839, 220 Ga. 610, 1965 Ga. LEXIS 571, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/shelton-v-state-ga-1965.