Case ID: ga-app_76/html/0007-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Townsend, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

31721.
    BROWN et al. v. THE STATE.
    Decided October 29, 1947.
    
      
      Louis H. Foster, for plaintiff in error.
    
      Maston O’Neal, Solicitor-General, contra.
   Townsend, J.

(After stating the foregoing facts.) Counsel for the defendants concedes that there was. sufficient evidence to support the verdict, and that the grounds of the amended motion based upon newly discovered evidence do not meet the requirements of law, and that the only question to be decided is whether or not defendants were denied their rights under art. I, sec. I, par. V of the Constitution. Where one accused of crime was upon his trial defended by an attorney at law appointed for this purpose by the presiding judge, it will, unless there be clear and convincing proof to the contrary, be presumed that this attorney did his duty in the premises and properly represented his client. See Fambles v. State, 97 Ga. 625 (2) (25 S. E. 365).

Although it is contended that the defendants on account of their ignorance, failed to tell their counsel about the witnesses, it affirmatively appears that they had sufficient intelligence to know about these witnesses themselves, to tell the sheriff about them, have him subpoena them, and have them present in court at the time of the trial. The record discloses that the attorney who was appointed by the court to conduct the defense of the plaintiffs in error did his full duty in the premises and properly represented his clients, and it further appears that any neglect resulting in the failure to use the witnesses for the defense, was the neglect of the plaintiffs in error and not that of their counsel.

The court did not err in overruling the motion for new trial.

Judgment affirmed.

MacIntyre, P. J. and Gardner, J., concur.