Case ID: nc_250/html/0601-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "PER Cueiam.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

STATE v. SAMUEL RICHARD MEDLIN.
    (Filed 12 June, 1959.)
    Appeal by defendant from Johnston, J., January Criminal Term, 1959, of Mooke.
    The defendant was tried on warrants charging him with an assault upon an officer, resisting arrest, drunken driving and failing to stop for a siren. In apt time defendant interposed a plea in abatement for change of venue .as to the alleged offenses of assault and resisting arrest. The court declined to change the venue and defendant entered pleas of not guilty on all charges in the warrants. Evidence was offered both by the State and the defendant. The court submitted the case to the jury only on the alleged offense of operating a vehicle on a .public highway while under the influence of intoxicating liquor. The jury found the defendant guilty of the violation of G.S. 20-138.
    From a judgment of imprisonment defendant appealed and assigned error.
    
      II. F. Seawell, Jr., for defendant, appellant.
    
    
      Attorney General Seawell and Assistant Attorney General Mc-Galliard for the State.
    
   PER Cueiam.

The action of the court in submitting the case to the jury only upon the charge of operating a vehicle on a public highway while under the influence of intoxicating liquor and the verdict of guilty only as to that offense are tantamount to a verdict of not guilty on the charges of assault, resisting arrest and failing to stop for a siren. S. v. Wolfe, 227 N.C. 461, 463, 42 S.E. 2d 515. Thus the question of the correctness of the judge’s ruling on the plea in abatement is moot. The evidence in the case was competent on the charge of drunken driving. In the conduct of the trial and the charge of the court no prejudicial error has been made to appear. S. v. Poolos, 241 N.C. 382, 383, 85 S.E. 2d 342.

No Error.