23 N.C. App. 694 | N.C. Ct. App. | 1974
Defendant assigns error to the trial court’s failure to sustain his objection to a portion of the solicitor’s final argument to the jury in which the solicitor intimated that the defendant, had his pistol contained additional bullets, would have also-killed Jérome Thomas, a friend of the deceased who was present at the shooting. We do not think, however, that in so ruling the trial court abused its discretion. The solicitor’s speculation was well founded. There was evidence that the defendant shot at Thomas as well as at the deceased and that all the bullets in defendant’s pistol were discharged. Furthermore, in this context, we find no prejudicial error when the trial judge, in denying defendant’s motion, said, “Well, I believe there is some-evidence of it.” The trial court was simply being accurate.
Defendant next assigns error to three portions of the court’s charge to the jury. First, defendant contends that the-court erred in ignoring that portion of his tendered request for jury instructions which moved the court to charge “about the presumption of innocence surrounding the defendant and the-continuation of the presumption throughout the course of the trial.” Although the court did not employ the exact words requested by defendant, the court did clearly instruct the jury that defendant was presumed to be innocent and that the bur
Other assignments of error noted in the record have not been brought forward in appellant’s brief and are deemed abandoned. In defendant’s trial and in the judgment appealed from we find
No error.