{
  "id": 1955463,
  "name": "THE STATE v. WILSON DEWER and WILLIAM BATTLE",
  "name_abbreviation": "State v. Dewer",
  "decision_date": "1871-06",
  "docket_number": "",
  "first_page": "572",
  "last_page": "573",
  "citations": [
    {
      "type": "official",
      "cite": "65 N.C. 572"
    }
  ],
  "court": {
    "name_abbreviation": "N.C.",
    "id": 9292,
    "name": "Supreme Court of North Carolina"
  },
  "jurisdiction": {
    "id": 5,
    "name_long": "North Carolina",
    "name": "N.C."
  },
  "cites_to": [],
  "analysis": {
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  "last_updated": "2023-07-14T18:41:56.423501+00:00",
  "provenance": {
    "date_added": "2019-08-29",
    "source": "Harvard",
    "batch": "2018"
  },
  "casebody": {
    "judges": [],
    "parties": [
      "THE STATE v. WILSON DEWER and WILLIAM BATTLE."
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "Peaeson, C. J.\nThe act 1868-9, ch. 167, entitled: \u201c An \u25a0act in relation to punishment\u201d abolishes the punishment of death, except for the crimes of murder and rape, and substitutes imprisonment in the State\u2019s prison for life or for years, for the crime of burning a barn with grain in it; the term is -not less than five, nor more than sixty years. The act also abolishes whipping and other corporeal punishments, and sub\u25a0stitutes imprisonment in the State\u2019s prison.\nTo support the ruling of his Honor, it is necessary to establish the proposition, that the effect of this statute, is to make all felonies, except murder and rape, \u201c misdemeanors.\u201d If that 'be so, his Honor was right, for there are no accessories before the fact in mere misdemeanors; and all are treated as principals. The statute is entitled: \u201c An act in relation to punishment.\u201d Its object is to substitute the Penitentiary for the gallows and the whipping post, that is all. How it can have the further effect, incidentally, to change the grade of crime, we .are not able to see. No authority was cited, and no reason was suggested in support of the proposition.\nThe prisoners might have been indicted and tried as accessories before the fact, and it was error to convict them under an indictment, in which they, with others, are all charged as principals.\nJudgment reversed. Per Curiam.",
        "type": "majority",
        "author": "Peaeson, C. J."
      }
    ],
    "attorneys": [
      "Attorney General, for the State.",
      "Ilowze, for defendants."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "THE STATE v. WILSON DEWER and WILLIAM BATTLE.\nWhere A and B are jointly indicted with others, for wilfully setting fire to and burning a barn containing grain, and the evidence showed that A and B were not present, but were accessories before the fact: Held', that they could not be convicted as principals under this indictment.\nThe effect of the act of 1868-69. chap. 167, entitled \u201can act in relation to punishments,\u201d was not to make \u201c misdemeanors \u201d of offences which were formerly felonies.\nIndictment for wilfully burning a barn containing grain^ tried-before Toiorgee, Jat Spring Term, 1871, of Chatham Superior Court.\nThe defendants with Henderson Nash, Hardy Stewart, Luke-Olive and Wyatt Boylan, wrere jointly indicted for wilfully and feloniously setting fire to and burning a barn, containing grain,, the property of one James IT. Minims.\nDuring the progress of the trial the Solicitor for the State-offered to prove that the defendants Wilson W. Dewer and* William Battle, advised, abetted, aided and procured their co-defendants to burn the said barn, to which defendants objected.. Objection overruled, and the evidence allowed.\nThe defendants\u2019 counsel asked the Court to charge the jury,, that although they might find the defendants, Dewer and Battle, guilty as accessories before the fact, yet they could not convict under this bill, unless they were present and participated in the burning, which instructions the Court declined to give.\nYerdict guilty, as to all the defendants, except Henderson. Nash.\nJudgment of the Court, that the defendants Olive and Stewart be imprisoned in the Penitentiary for fifteen years,, and Dewer and Battle, for twelve years at hard labor.\nAppeal by the defendants, Dewer and Battle.\nAttorney General, for the State.\nIlowze, for defendants."
  },
  "file_name": "0572-01",
  "first_page_order": 582,
  "last_page_order": 583
}