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228 N.C. 153

44 S.E.2d 725

State v. . Edwards

Supreme Court of North Carolina

Decided November 5, 1947

Supreme Court of North Carolina · decided 1947-11-05

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1947-11-05

How this case has been cited

Cited by 22 later decisions — most recently December 1982

22 state decisions

16019471950196019701980decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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DeviN, J.

¶1 The defendants’ assignment of error based upon the ruling of the trial court in permitting extended cross-examination of the defendants and their witnesses in the effort by the State to impeach the accuracy and credibility of their testimony, cannot be sustained. The limits of legitimate cross-examination are largely within the discretion of the trial judge, and his ruling thereon will not be held for error in the absence of showing that the verdict was improperly influenced thereby. *155 S. v. Stone, 226 N. C., 97, 36 S. E. (2d), 704; S. v. Beal, 199 N. C., 278, 154 S. E., 604.

¶2 Tbe defendants expepted to the court’s charge to the jury in that in several particulars pointed out the court misstated the evidence. But a comparison of the language and expressions used by the court in stating the evidence, of which defendants now complain, with the testimony of the witnesses as shown by the record, reveals that there was no material variance between the two. While the exact language of the witnesses may not have been used, the substance of their testimony seems to have been fairly stated to the jury, and no harm to the defendants’ cause or prejudicial effect is discernible. Nor was the court’s attention called to any incorrect reference to the evidence. The other portions of the charge excepted to, when considered in connection with the entire charge, do not show prejudicial error. S. v. Sterling, 200 N. C., 18 (23), 156 S. E., 96.

¶3 The defendants’ exception to the failure of the court properly to declare and apply the law relating to the charge of assault with a deadly weapon, cannot avail the defendants on this record, since it appears that the defendants were convicted of the larceny of an automobile, in the perpetration of which the assault was alleged to have been committed, and were sentenced for terms of two to four years, while the sentences for assault were for two years, to run concurrently with the sentences in the larceny case. Thus, no additional punishment was imposed nor other injury sustained by the defendants growing out of the indictment for assault with deadly weapon. S. v. Smith, 221 N. C., 400, 20 S. E. (2d), 360; S. v. Graham, 224 N. C., 347, 30 S. E. (2d), 151; S. v. Weinstein, 224 N. C., 645, 31 S. E. (2d), 920.

¶4 There was no motion for judgment of nonsuit. The State’s evidence was sufficient to sustain the verdict and judgment. In the trial we find

¶5 No error.

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