8 Ga. App. 114 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1910
The defendant was convicted in the lower court of a violation of the “labor-contract law” of 1903 (Acts 1903, p. 90), and lie excepts to the judgment overruling the motion for a new trial. In addition to the general grounds of the motion for a- new trial, the defendant assigns error upon the failure of the court to' specifically instruct the jury that they must be satisfied from the evidence that the intention to cheat and swindle the prosecutor existed on the part of the defendant at the time the money1 or other things of value were advanced, before they would be authorized to convict. The presence of the intent to defraud at the time the advances are procured, as was pointed out in Patterson v. State, 1 Ga. App. 782 (58 S. E. 254), is the only thing which prevents the punishment for violation of the act of 1903 from being mere imprisonment for debt, and therefore violative of the constitution; and in Mulkey v. State, 1 Ga. App. 521 (57 S. E. 1022), we expressly held that it is the duty of the court to instruct the jury, even in the absence of a written request, that in order to authorize a conviction the intention to cheat and swindle the prosecutor must have existed on the'part of the defendant at the time the money was advanced. TJpon a review of the charge we find that this principle, while perhaps’hinted at, was not clearly presented in the'charge of the court; and we are therefore of the opinion that the defendant should have another trial.
Judgment reversed.