The defendant, town constable of the village of Hazel-wood, in Haywood County, sbot and killed Will Fletcher, a colored man employed on a work-train of the Southern Railway Company, while undertaking tо arrest the deceased for jumping on and off a moving train in violation of a town ordinance prohibiting such conduct.
It was in evidence that the deceased had habitually violated this ordinancе by getting on a passenger train as it would leave the station at Hazelwood, riding some distance аnd then jumping off near a shanty car in which Fletcher and other employees were housed and whiсh stood on a siding near where they worked.
On Easter Sunday, 1924, the defendant saw the deceased “swinging on the train.” He went down to the shanty car, without any warrant for his arrest, and said to Fletcher, “Let’s go see thе mayor.” Fletcher asked: “What for?” Defendant answered: “For catching the train.” Fletcher said: “I cаn’t go until the boss man comes back from Ashe-ville.” Defendant replied: “You will have to go now.” Then Fletcher asked the officer to let him go into the shanty car and get his coat. A few minutes after entering the car, Fletcher came to the door and said: “I can’t go now; the boss man ain’t here.” The defеndant replied: “You will go”; and as he started to enter the car, Fletcher fired one time with a revolver, the bullet entering the door-facing just above the officer’s head. The defendant shot four times in return, one shot striking Fletcher in the face and proving fatal.
Whether the defendant was justified in undertaking to arrest Fletcher without a warrant should be determined in accordance with the rules laid down in
S. v. Rogers,
The trial court instructed the jury that there was no evidence of manslaughter in the case, and that they would therеfore convict the defendant of murder in the second degree or acquit him, under his plea of sеlf-defense, as they found the facts to be. The jury convicted the defendant of murder in the second dеgree. We think there was error, to the prejudice of the defendant, in excluding from the jury’s considerаtion the question of manslaughter.
It is a well recognized rule of practice with us that where one is indiсted for a crime, and under the same bill it is permissible to convict the defendant of “a less degreе of the same crime, or of an attempt to commit the crime so charged, or of an attempt to commit a less degree of the same crime” (C. S., 4640), and there is evidence tending to suppоrt a milder verdict, the prisoner is entitled to have the different views presented to the jury, under a prоper charge, and an error in this respect is not cured by a verdict convicting him of the crime аs charged in the bill of indictment, for in such case it cannot be known
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wbetber the jury would have convicted of a less degree if the different views, arising on the evidence, bad been correctly presented by the trial court.
S. v. Lutterloh, ante,
412;
S. v. Merrick,
Murder in the second degree is the unlawful killing of a human being with malice, but without premeditation and deliberation; while manslaughter is the unlawful killing of a human being without malice and without premeditation and deliberation. The presence in the one case and the absence in the other of the element of malice- is the distinguishing difference between these two grades of an unlawful homicide.
S. v. Benson,
Where it is admitted or established by the evidence, as it is here, that the defendant killed the deceаsed with a deadly weapon, the law raises two presumptions against him: first, that the killing was unlawful; and second, that it was done with malice. This is murder in the second degree.
S. v. Fowler,
One is permitted to kill in self-defense
(S. v. Johnson,
There is evidence on the record tending to show that while the defendant may have fired at first in self-defense, yet the jury might have found that he continued tо fire unnecessarily. There are circumstances in evidence, surrounding the occurrence and from which it may fairly be inferred that the defendant’s repeated firing was unnecessary to his own proрer self-defense; but, if done without malice, his offense would not be more than manslaughter.
S. v. Quick,
150 N. C., p. 824. In
S. v. Cox,
153 N. C., p. 642, it is said “that in order to make good the plea of self-defense, the force used must be exerted in good fаith to prevent the threatened injury, and must not be excessive or disproportionate to the fоrce it is intended to repel, but the question of excessive force was to be determined. by the jury.” See, also,
S. v. Pollard,
For the error, as indicated, there must be a new trial; and it is so ordered.
New trial.