55 Ga. App. 754 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1937
In a criminal case the solicitor-general may properly refer to the fact that the accused, although having had witnesses called and sworn, has failed to put them on the stand to rebut evidence introduced by the State. Saffold v. State, 11 Ga. App. 329 (75 S. E. 338); Ponder v. State, 18 Ga. App. 727 (2) (90 S. E. 376); State v. Niger, 115 N. C. 746 (2) (20 5. E. 456). Under the above-stated ruling the refusal of the court to declare a mistrial in the instant case was not error.
A ground of the motion for new trial complains of the following charge: “Now if yop should find on the back of this indictment a verdict • as to some other defendant in this case, it would be your duty to disregard that; you have nothing to do with that at all; you fix your verdict as to Willard Chavis [the defendant on trial] from this evidence on this trial, and from no other source.” The complaint is that the court erred in so charging, and in “sending out with the jury the verdict of guilty, rendered the previous day, against the codefendant Emmett Carter, without covering the same up,” the verdict against said Carter not having been put in evidence. In his order overruling the motion for new trial the judge included the following note: “The court was anxious that the jury be not influenced in any way by the finding in the other case, [and] gave them positive instructions to fix their
The other special assignments of error show no cause for reversal of the judgment.
The defendant was convicted of simple larceny (cattle-stealing) ; and the evidence for the State, while wholly circumstantial, was sufficient to exclude every reasonable hypothesis save that of his guilt. The defendant introduced no evidence, and his statement was evidently rejected by the jury, as they had the right to do. The verdict was amply authorized by the evidence, and the denial of a new trial was not error for any reason assigned.
Judgment affirmed.