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68 Ga. App. 735

23 S.E.2d 870

Canady v. State

Court of Appeals of Georgia

Decided January 12, 1943

Court of Appeals of Georgia · decided 1943-01-12

Relies on 2 Ga. App. 730 - Cooper v. State · 67 Ga. App. 509 - Alabama Great Southern Railroad v. McBryar

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1943-01-12

How this case has been cited

Cited by 6 later decisions — most recently July 1991

6 state decisions

20194319501960197019801990decided

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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MacIntyre, J.

¶1 The accusation charged Canady, alone, with the possession of non-tax-paid liquor. The evidence^ for the State showed that the defendant was in an automobile with Warren, his father-in-law, and they were being pursued by the officers in another automobile; that the defendant was driving the car and Warren was seen by the officers- *736 to break three bottles of whisky before the officers could force them to stop their automobile. An officer testified for the State that the automobile belonged to the defendant. The defendant in his statement to the jury said: “I am not guilty of this hauling whisky. Mr. Warren was riding with me, and had this is his pocket. It was his. 1 had nothing to do with it.” The judge charged the jury: “Gentlemen, these two parties were in the car, and there was an understanding that this was the defendant’s ear, and his father-in-law was riding with him, both charged with transporting and possessing liquor.” Held:

Decided January 12, 1943. W. G. Neville, for plaintiff in error. B. II. Ramsey, solicitor, contra.

¶2 1. The record does not disclose any admission by the defendant that there was any understanding between him and Warren, the other occupant of the car. The charge above quoted was an expression by the judge of an opinion of what had been proved.

¶3 2. Certain rebuttable presumptions would arise if the car “was the defendant’s car.”

¶4 3. To assume that the car in question was the defendant’s car, and to so instruct the jury when no such admission had been made, was reversible error. Cooper v. State, 2 Ga. App. 730 (59 S. E. 20).

¶5 4. When the judge in his charge expresses his opinion as to what has or has not been proved, he violates Code § 81-1104; and under the mandatory provision of this section we are required to reverse the judgment denying a new trial. Alabama Great Southern Railroad, Co. v. McBryar, 67 Ga. App. 509, 514 (21 S. E. 2d, 173).

¶6 Judgment reversed.

Broyles, C. J., and Gardner, J., concur.
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