11 Ga. App. 89 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1912
The accused was convicted of having and keeping on hand intoxicating liquors at his place of business, and excepts to the overruling of his motion for a new trial. The chief contention of counsel for the plaintiff in error is that the evidence demanded a verdict of not guilty. Taking the evidence most strongly for the State, as it must be taken in this court, the facts were as follows : The accused was in possession of four rooms, all under one roof and referred to in the evidence as rooms A, B, C, and D. A was a front room, in which the accused conducted a grocery business. In the rear of A was a door leading into B. C was entered by means of a door from B, and another door connected C with D, which was a small room, about four and a half by eight feet. A restaurant had been conducted by the accused in one of the rear rooms of these apartments, but was not in operation when the arrest was made, though a cook-stove, a little table, and some chairs were in the room. Several dozen bottles of “Magnolia beer” .were found in an ice-box in room C, and in D were found fifteen bottles of rye whisky, six bottles of corn, and one of gin. Some of the whisky was in a satchel, and some between the mattress and springs of a cot. The mattress was old and dirty, and there were no sheets, pillows, or bedding of any sort. The accused resided across the block from his store. He admitted ownership of the liquor, but claimed that he bought it for a personal use, and that he did not keep it at his place of business, but kept it in a room used by him as a place to sleep, and where he did sleep occasionally, so as to be near his business.
We can not agree with counsel for the accused that the conviction was not authorized. Manifestly rooms B, C, and D were convenient adjuncts to room A, wherein the grocery business was being conducted. Certainly the place was not his residence, for he lived elsewhere. It is immaterial that the beer may not have been shown to be intoxicating. There was too much liquor that would produce drunkenness; the circumstances were too suspicious; the cot and dirty mattress were but a flimsy pretext; the stove, chairs, and table all indicate that the rooms B and C and D were maintained as a part of the establishment, and as a convenient place in which to keep intoxicating liquors for unlawful use.
The conviction in this case was fully authorized. There are numerous assignments of error. Such of them as require special notice 'are dealt with in the headnotes, which do not need elaboration. The case was not. one in which the court was bound to charge without request the rules of law relating to circumstantial evidence, even if the conviction can be properly said to rest even in part upon this character of evidence. Harvey v. State, 8 Ga. App. 660 (70 S. E. 141). The trial was free from prejudicial error.
Judgment affirmed.