23 Ga. App. 79 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1918
1. Under repeated rulings of the Supreme Court and of this'court, the overruling of a demurrer to an indictment can not properly be made a ground of a motion for a new trial. To enable this court to review such a judgment, direct exception to it must be taken in a bill of exceptions.
2. One of the special grounds of.the motion for a new trial is as follows: “Because, before striking the jury in said ease, counsel for movant stated’ to the court that he had just been informed .that the Miners Association, composed of a number of citizens of Bartow County, had employed counsel to assist the solicitor in prosecuting movant, which the counsel so employed admitted was true; and then movant’s counsel asked, and moved the court to hold and decide, that all jurors who were membérs or related to either of the members of said Miners Association by blood or marriage, within the ninth degree, were disqualified to sit as jurors in said case; which motion the court overruled, holding that only members of the Miners Association were disqualified, and held that other jurors were qualified to sit in said case, and required movant to strike a jury from the regular panel without inquiry as to such relationship; which judgment, holding-, and direction of the court, movant alleges was error, as being contrary to law.” Even if the ruling complained of were error (which is not here passed upon), it does not appear that the defendant was injured thereby, qince it is not shown that any of the jurors upon the panel put upon the defendant were related to any of the members of the Miners Association. .
3. The admission of testimony as complained of in the 3d special ground of the motion for a new trial, even if erroneous, was not so prejudicial to the accused as to require a new trial.
4. A special ground of the motion for a new trial complains of a remark of the court, made to the defendant’s counsel dhring ,the trial of the case and in the presence of the jury, as being prejudicial to the accused. Inasmuch, however, as it does not appear that any motion for a mistrial was made because of the remark, no question for this court
5. Under repeated decisions of this court and of the Supreme Court, where a special ground of a motion for a, new trial is so incomplete as to re- , quire the reviewing court to refer to the brief of the evidence, or other portions of the record, it will not be considered. -This ruling disposes of the 5th special ground of the motion for a new trial.
6. While there are some slight inaccuracies in the excerpt from the charge of the court, as complained of in the 6th special ground of the motion . for a new trial, these inaccuracies, when considered with the charge as a whole and in the light of the facts of the case, do not require a new trial.
7. There is no merit in the ground of the motion for a new trial which sets up that since the trial of the ease the main witness for the State “has committed the crime of burglary, and has been indicted, plead guilty, and sentenced therefor to ten years in the penitentiary.”
8. The verdict is authorized by the evidence and has been approved by the trial judge.
Judgment affirmed.