Case ID: ga_88/html/0297-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Russell v. The State.
    Criminal law. Murder. Manslaughter.
    The evidence showing that the prisoner and deceased, a much larger man, were in a quarrel in the field where they were at work; that after giving the deceased the “damned lie,” the prisoner went to a branch near by, took a drink of water, procured a flint stone about the size of one’s fist, put it in his pocket, and returned to the scene of the quarrel; that the deceased resumed the quarrel, and advanced upon him with a knife, threatening to kill him; that the prisoner, in resistance to this assault, struck the deceased with a stick which he had in his hand to work with; that the deceased, continuing to advance, cut the prisoner in the j aw with his knife, also cut his hat in several places, and after breaking the knife, started off looking down in a stooping position as if intending to procure a stone or something else to fight with; that another person present threw a stone at deceased and hit him in the back, and that immediately thereafter the prisoner also threw the stone which he had-concealed in his pocket, and hitting him on the back of the head, inflicted the mortal wound: Held, that the offence was not murder, but voluntary manslaughter.
    Bleckley, C. J., dubitante.
    
    February 3, 1892.
   Judgment reversed.

Before Judge Boynton. Newton superior court. March term, 1891.

J. M. Pace and E. E. Edwards, by brief, for plaintiff in error.

W. A. Little, attorney-general, by J. EL Lumpkin, and E. Womack, solicitor-general, contra.