Court Opinion

ID: 9582755
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:30:56.720878+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:38:17.933178
License: Public Domain

Head, J.,
dissenting from the rulings in division 10 of the opinion, and the judgment of affirmance. A general verdict of guilty without a recommendation of mercy is never demanded as a matter of law in this State. Jones v. State, 207 Ga. 379 (62 S. E. 2d 187). In no case is a trial judge authorized to so charge as to impose a limitation upon the jury in the recommendation of mercy. This is true however heinous the crime, and regardless of the nature of the evidence relied upon to establish the guilt of the accused. The authorities cited and relied upon by the majority do not support or sustain the charge assigned as error on the ground that a limitation was imposed. Only in the case of Wheat v. State, 187 Ga. 480, is there any relation to the question here made. In the Wheat case the trial judge charged: “If you should decide for any reason satisfactory to yourselves, or without any reason, to recommend that the defendant be imprisoned for life, then that would be binding upon the court and that would be the sentence imposed upon the defendant.” (Italics supplied.) Standing alone, the implication that the jury had to have a “satisfactory reason” for their recommendation of mercy would impose a limitation on the right to recommend, in violation of the rule that the jury is not restricted in any way. The jury was instructed in in the same sentence, however, that they could recommend without any reason. This removed the implication that the jury had to have some reason for their recommendation.
In the present case, the trial judge charged the jury: “I charge you that you can make that recommendation [mercy] with or without reason.” This charge was correct and is supported by the authorities cited by the majority in this division of the opinion. Had the trial judge stopped with this charge, there would be no valid ground for complaint. After correctly charging, how*259ever, in the language quoted, he continued: “It is a matter for the satisfaction of the jury,” etc. It may well be that the trial judge intended to use the word “determination,” and this would not have been error. Thomas v. State, 129 Ga. 419 (59 S. E. 246). Assignments of error, however, are not reviewed upon what might have been done, but upon the record. The word “satisfaction” has a number of meanings. It means the “fulfillment of any need,” or “that which operates so as to discharge an obligation.” Webster’s International Dictionary (2d ed.), p. 2220. In the present case the jury could not properly have been limited to finding a “need” that they recommend mercy, nor could they have been limited in that they must have found an “obligation” to so recommend before they would have been authorized to do so. The final result in the present case was to so limit and restrict a correct charge by an incorrect one that the defendant was deprived of a substantial right under the law. Hill v. State, 72 Ga. 131; Cohen v. State, 116 Ga. 573 (42 S. E. 781); Thompson v. State, 203 Ga. 416 (47 S. E. 2d 54).