Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-07-03
-Arxument by Counsel.

hard labor.
1f- ll Argument by Counsel.
AT Walworth's trial to-day large crowd
was present. District Attorney Phelps, in
an argument for the prosecution, contro-
verted the claims of the defense that the
prisoner was afflicted either by epilepsy or
insanity.
Mr.. O'Connor, for the defense, then made
several requests to the judge to charge the
Jury, including one that be charge that facts
to murder, that if the accused believed
the deceased to be desperate, 1t
initiates against the theory of
murder In the first degree; and if the act
was the result of terror, it was not murder
in the second degree; that as tour shots
were fired, the prisoner was only conscious
of firing three, and as no proof is given
which Of the four was fatal, the jury must
acquit; that if he was in a state OF epileptic
insanity, he was not responsible, and if he
was in a stste of terror which overcome
him, the jury must acquit. Without deliv
eriDg his charge, the court took recess.
The Judge's Charge TO the Jury.
After recess, Judge Davis delivered his
charge to the jury, and called attention TO
the new law under which the trial has
taken place, and which max it necess ary
tha deliberate purpose and premeditation
should exist before verdict of murder in
the first degree could be given.
Judge Davis said, if the jury were salts
fed from the evidence that young Walworth
came to New York with the intention to
murder his father, then the crime was muir
- kAa ht,F 70 ba
was committed in sudden manner, in an
instant, then it would be murder in the
second degree. Judge Davis, continuing,
said that defense interposed was twotold-
that the prisoner was insane at the time of
the act, and secondly, that the act was done
in selfdefense. The second h. proceeded
to consider first, and warned the jury that
there were no such crimes known TO the
law as parricide, or matricde, or fratricide,
however well these names misht be used
in common conversation; nor was this
court to take into consideration the laws of
ancient Greece, or Rome, or China, where
special laws were enacted for the punish
ment of those who killed their parents. In
the eyes of the law this crime was no
greater than killing q stranger; therefore
the same rules were to be adopted as In q
trial for kill g Of person other than his
father, and the prisoner is entitled to the
same consideration. In regard to the ques-
lion of justification, his Honor charged,
howevrr, that the jury should Tot regai
fears which the prisonet entertained for the
life of his mother, as they could not be re-
garded as any justification of his crime.
Tney should only regard those fears which
were personal. The law Gid not make it
justification when the killing was done
through fear that the life of another was in
danger. They could, however, consider
whether the fear that his mothers's life was
in danger did not give point to fear which
be entertained for bis own lie on meeting
on the morning of the third.
Verdict of the Jury.
The jury retired about O'Clock, and at
$40 brought in verdict of murder in the
second degree.
A Human Brute.
Ttos. Feeney was arrested for fatally
beating his mother, in Brooklyn last night.