Court Opinion

ID: 9586050
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:06:41.319573+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:24:19.385953
License: Public Domain

Higgins, J.,
dissenting: This is one of the few, occasions in which I find it -impossible to agree w-ith my brethren. The evidence in the case discloses that on Friday night, -September 27,1957, just after dark, the defendant Horner was at a drive-in theater in Fayetteville. At that time one Clyde Taylor drove up. In the car with him were the defendant Gordy -and a woman who was lying .in the seat -or .on the floor of the car. Gordy said he could not tell Horner who she was. The def-endw ant Horner looked at her and said they had better -get her somewhere and get her to bed. Thereafter, they took her to Horner’s house and put her to 'bed. Taylor left. About five next morning the defendants took her to Eunice Hall’s house. Eunice was up, getting breakfast. The three did more drinking. What took place thereafter is stated fully in the Court’s opinion.
It seems to be the theory of the State that somewhere, probably at Eunice Hall’s house, the defendants administered to Sarah Lindsay a terrible beating which finally caused her death; that the call, “Help, someone help me,” heard in the vicinity, not only came from the Hall house but it came from the deceased because of a beating she was *353then receiving; and, further, that the beating was being administered by the defendants. The State successfully asked the jury to find the above without calling the one person apparently in a position to know firsthand what happened — Eunice Hall. The State says its theory is supported by Horner’s statement: “There (the Hall house) is where it happened.” Where what happened? Horner didn’t say. The officer didn’t ask him. According to the State’s evidence one thing certainly did happen at the Hall house — an obese woman with an enlarged liver fell off a cot and after the fall, “she groaned and groaned.”
One of the State’s witnesses testified that about eight o’clock on Saturday morning two men dragged a woman from the Hall house towards a car. However, further questioning elicited the following: “What I saw the men doing was helping the woman off the porch.” Thereafter, the defendants — Horner driving — took the woman to the place where she was found about six hours later and put her out of the car. After they put her out, “she started to raise cain and said they couldn’t leave her, and she tried to get back in the car.” Horner shoved her back, got in the car and drove off. Such is the State’s evidence, gained in part by interrogation of the defendants, but none the less the State’s evidence. That a woman should “raise cain” and should try to get back in the car with two men who had terribly beaten her presents a picture that is a little too much out of focus for my mental gallery.
The first time Horner saw the woman she was either lying on the back seat or on the floor of Taylor’s car, “passed out.” Taylor and Gordy were also in the car. What injuries she had received, if any, or how she had received them prior to the time Horner first saw her does not appear. Gordy could not tell Horner who she was; and Taylor, the owner of the car, was not called to testify. There is not a particle of evidence that either defendant laid a violent hand on Sarah Lindsay, except Horner. The evidence indicates all he did was to shove her away when she tried to get back in the car.
The most suspicious thing in the case, however, was Horner’s removal of the seat covers of his car to get rid of the bloodstains. This occurred after it became known that Sarah Lindsay had died. When asked about it, he told the officers and showed them the old seat covers. It is understandable, that after such a night, he would want to remove the bloodstains. But, after all, the important and the unanswered question is how the injury occurred that caused the blood. Where, when, how the fatal injuries were received, the evidence does not disclose. The answers are in the realm of speculation and guess. Had she been injured when Taylor and Gordy appeared with her at the drive-in? Was she injured by the fall from the cot? What happened to her during *354the six hours between the time the defendants left her and the time she was discovered still alive, are unanswered questions. “True it is, the evidence seems to point an accusing finger at the defendant as the perpetrator of the crime, and to excite suspicion, somewhat strongly perhaps, of his guilt, but it apparently leaves too much to surmise or assumption to support a conviction.” The foregoing are the words of the late Chief Justice Stacy in the case of State v. Harvey, 228 N.C. 62, 44 S.E. 2d 472. They fit this case.
I can agree the defendants’ conduct in putting this woman out in the rain was shabby indeed, but to say the evidence supports manslaughter is too much for me. I vote to reverse.