3 Ga. App. 305 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1907
1. The defendant demurred to the indictment, on the ground that the property alleged to have been stolen is not sufficiently described. “The description should be simply such as, in connection with the other allegations, will affirmatively show the defendant to be guilty, will reasonably inform him of the instance meant, and put him in a position to make the needful preparations
2. The offense with which the defendant stood charged was a misdemeanor. The court charged the jury: “This case is being tried as a felony, and if you should find the defendant guilty jura have the right to recommend — add, to your verdict finding him guilty, recommendation punishing him for a misdemeanor.” The jury recommended that the defendant be punished as for a misdemeanor. We presume the court inflicted a legal sentence, as no insistence to the contrary is made. In certifying this ground of the motion for a new trial the judge, in an explanatory note, says: “For some reason the court and counsel for both the State and the accused tried the case under the impression that, the property being of greater value than $50, the charge amounted to a felony, .and the case so tried up to the time of the delivery of the charge.” The error in trying the case with the strict formality of a felony trial rather than with the ordinary misdemeanor procedure seems to have been a disadvantage to the State rather than to the accused. While error; it was, as against the defendant (no special injury being shown), harmless error.
3. When the attachment under which the levy was made was offered in evidence, objection was made on the ground that the levy, as appearing from the entry on the attachment, is void for lack of definite description. The seizure, not the entry, constituted the levy. There was sufficient evidence of an actual levy. Corniff v. Cook, 95 Ga. 61 (2), (22 S. E. 47, 51 Am. St. R. 55).
4. Exception is taken to the following instruction by the court to the jury: “If you believe in this case that the defendant, in this county, on the day named in the bill of indictment, or within two
5. Upon an examination of the entire record, we find no erroy. While the property belonged to the defendant, the constable had such a title as to make the defendant’s fraudulently taking the property and carrying it into another State with the purpose of appropriating it to his own use, thereby hindering or defeating the levy, a larceny. Davis v. State, 76 Ga. 721; Henry v. State, 110 Ga. 750 (36 S. E. 55, 78 Am. St. R. 137). His contention of good faith was fairly submitted to the jury. Therefore let the judgment refusing him a new trial be Affirmed.