Smith v. State

202 Ga. 851
CourtSupreme Court of Georgia
DecidedOctober 23, 1947
DocketNo. 15969
StatusPublished

This text of 202 Ga. 851 (Smith 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
Smith v. State, 202 Ga. 851 (Ga. 1947).

Opinion

Head, Justice.

(After stating the foregoing facts.) 1. While all of the admissions of the defendant in this case were coupled with explanations of the killing which might be sufficient, if believed, to justify the defendant, or to reduce the crime to voluntary manslaughter, the State introduced circumstantial evidence which disproved the theory that the defendant shot the deceased while he was coming toward him with a beer bottle. All of the wounds were in the back of the deceased, and one of the bullet wounds was made after death, according to the testimony of the physicians attending the autopsy. Such evidence would refute the defendant’s statement that the deceased was attacking him at the time he shot. The statement of the defendant that an employee in his place of business hit the deceased over the head with a beer bottle, and the deceased wiped his head on a blouse found at the defendant’s place of business, was contradicted by the testimony of Dr. Jones that the blood spots on the blouse and those on the clothing of the deceased could not have been the same type and made at approximately the same time, because the blood on the blouse could not be typed, while that on the clothing of the deceased was type “A.” Other statements of the defendant were contradicted by the evidence for the State.

The jury in passing upon an incriminating admission may believe a portion of it and reject the balance as false. Cook v. State, 114 Ga. 525 (40 S. E. 703). The circumstantial evidence in this ease was sufficient to authorize the jury to reject the defendant’s contention that the killing was in self-defense, and the verdict of the jury finding the defendant guilty of murder was supported by the evidence.

2. Special ground 1 assigns error because the court refused the following written request to charge: “Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being, in the peace of the State, by a person of sound memory and discretion, with malice aforethought, either-expressed ox implied. You will observe from the definition, I have just given you, of murder, that, in order for the killing to amount to murder, the slayer must have been activated by malice, either-expressed or implied.” It is insisted that the charge was peculiarly [860]*860applicable and pertinent to the facts of the case because the defendant in his statement denied having any reason for wanting to harm the deceased; that there was no direct evidence as to who killed the deceased aside from' the statement of the accused; and that the refusal to charge was prejudicial and harmful to the defendant because he was thereby deprived of the legal right, to wit, “of the burden of proof being upon the State to show beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant was activated by malice in slaying deceased.”

The court in its charge gave the definition of murder, and express and implied malice, as set out in the Code. Subsequently, in charging on the presumption that might arise from the use of a deadly weapon, the court stated: “If the accused admits the killing with a deadly weapon, but adds an explanation which might negative malice, no presumption that the homicide was perpetrated with malice would arise under such admission, but it would be incumbent upon the State to prove malice before you would be authorized to convict the defendant of murder; that is, if you believe he admits killing him with an explanation that tends to negative malice, . . then there is no presumption of malice that would arise, but it would be up to the State then to prove malice to your satisfaction beyond a reasonable doubt.”

The charge of the court sufficiently instructed the jury on the necessity for the State to show malice before the defendant could be convicted, and a refusal to charge in the exact language of the request does not require a reversal. Slocumb v. State, 157 Ga. 133 (8) (121 S. E. 116).

3. Grounds 2, 3, and 4 complain that the court erred in refusing to give certain written requests to charge, which are on the same subject and may be considered together. The requested instruction tset out in ground 2 is as follows: “I charge you that murder does not consist merely in the killing of a human being; the killing must be done with malice. When the fact of the killing is shown, and the evidence adduced to establish the killing shows neither circumstances of justification nor alleviation, malice may be inferred. Likewise, if the statement of the defendant admits the homicide without explanation, malice may be inferred from such admission. But if at the time of the admission the homicide is justified, such qualification of the admission of the homicide robs it of the vital element of murder, and the burden would still be on the State to show that the killing was done with malice.”

[861]*861Ground 3 sets out the following requested instruction: “I charge you that, if the accused admits the killing with a deadly weapon, but adds an explanation which might negative malice, no presumption that the homicide was murder would arise from such admission.”

The requested instruction in ground 4 is: “Where the evidence relied upon by the State to establish the fact of the homicide discloses circumstances of mitigation or justification, such evidence does not raise a presumption of malice, and the burden would still rest upon the State to prove malice, on the part of the slayer, beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Counsel for the defendant cite Manning v. State, 153 Ga. 196 (111 S. E. 658), as being a case where the failure to charge the identical request set out in ground 2 was held to be error. In the Manning case the defendant was not given the benefit of the principle of law requested by any charge of the court. In the present case the court charged as follows: “Now I charge you, gentlemen of the jury, that ordinarily, if one kill another with a deadly weapon without justification or mitigating circumstances, the jury would have the right to presume malice, but I charge you, gentlemen of the jury, that, if the accused admits the killing with a deadly weapon, but adds an explanation which might negative malice, no presumption that the homicide was perpetrated with malice would arise under such admission, but it would be incumbent upon the State to prove malice before you would be- authorized to convict the defendant of murder; that is, if you believe he admits killing him with an explanation that tends to negative malice, as I said, then there is no presumption of malice that would arise, but it would be up to the State then to prove malice to your satisfaction beyond a reasonable doubt.”

The charge of the court gave the defendant full benefit of the principles of law set out in his requests to charge quoted in grounds 2, 3, and 4, and he could not have been harmed by a failure to charge in the exact language of the requests.

4. Ground 5 contends that the court erred in refusing to give in charge a written request which contained almost the exact definition of manslaughter as found in the Code, § 26-1006 (with the exception of that portion in regard to involuntary manslaughter), and practically the definition of voluntary manslaughter as found [862]*862in the Code, § 26-1007. It is insisted that such request was not covered, or substantially covered, by the general charge, that certain quoted evidence demanded it, and that the charge given on manslaughter was commingled with the law of murder.

The court charged the Code, § 26-1007, but did not charge § 26-1006.

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Clare v. Drexler
110 S.E. 176 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1921)
Collins v. State
111 S.E. 733 (Supreme Court of Georgia, 1922)
Manning v. State
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Slocumb v. State
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Bryant v. State
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Little v. State
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Bluebook (online)
202 Ga. 851, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/smith-v-state-ga-1947.