Case Name: Joe Mathews, plaintiff in error, vs. The State of Georgia, defendant in error
Court: Supreme Court of Georgia
Jurisdiction: Georgia
Decision Date: 1876-01
Citations: 56 Ga. 469
Docket Number: 
Parties: Joe Mathews, plaintiff in error, vs. The State of Georgia, defendant in error.
Judges: 
Reporter: Georgia Reports
Volume: 56
Pages: 469–470

Head Matter:
Joe Mathews, plaintiff in error, vs. The State of Georgia, defendant in error.
The newly discovered evidence in this case suggests such a doubt as to whether the prisoner’s offense may not be voluntary manslaughter instead of murder; that, although not fully convinced that he is entitled to a new trial, under the strict rules of law, this court, in the exercise of the discretion confided to it by statute, directs a new trial, in order that the prisoner may have his case examined in the light of all the evidence, by a jury, whose province it will be to look at the facts themselves, and not suffer the doubt above indicated to influence their finding, unless a like doubt shall arise in their own minds by reason of the evidence which shall come before them, nor unless it shall moreover seem to them to be a reasonable doubt.
. Criminal law. New trial. Before Judge Rice. Oconee Superior Court. November Term, 1875.
Report unnecessary.
Cobb, Erwin & Cobb ; S. P. Thurmond ; J. R. Lyle ; P. G. Thompson, for plaintiff in error.
Emory Speer, solicitor general, for the state.

Opinion:
Bleckley, Judge.
There is no error in the record, except as to the newly discovered evidence. In respect to that, while we are not entirely convinced, we deem it best to treat the case as special and peculiar, and give it the direction indicated in the headnote. Human life being involved, we do not feel quite warranted in denying a new trial on the state of facts.
Judgment reversed.