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31 N.C. App. 389

229 S.E.2d 202

State v. Best

Court of Appeals of North Carolina

Decided November 3, 1976

Court of Appeals of North Carolina · decided 1976-11-03

Relies on State v. Dooley · 26 N.C. App. 193 - State v. Moore · 28 N.C. App. 481 - State v. Wright

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1976-11-03

How this case has been cited

Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently April 2007

5 state decisions

201976198019902000decided

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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CLARK, Judge.

¶1 Defendant assigns as error the failure of the trial court to charge the jury on the law of shooting by accident or misadventure. Defendant did not request such an instruction.

¶2 The trial judge has a duty to “declare and explain the law arising on the evidence given in the case.” G.S. 1-180. Every substantial feature of the case arising on the evidence must be presented to the jury even without a special request for instructions on the issue. State v. Dooley, 285 N.C. 158, 203 S.E. 2d 815 (1974). In a case where the evidence offered by one party tends to show accident, it is not enough for the trial judge to charge that the State must prove intent beyond a reasonable doubt. The judge must also clearly explain that accident is the antithesis of intent. This was not done here. Two recent opinions by this Court have made clear this duty with respect to the law of accident in appropriate cases, and we see no reason to elaborate on their wisdom. State v. Wright, 28 N.C. App. 481, 221 S.E. 2d 745 (1976) ; State v. Moore, 26 N.C. App. 193, 215 S.E. 2d 171 (1975).

¶3 We order a

¶4 New trial.

Judges Morris and Arnold concur.
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