Supreme Court of Georgia, 1976

Cowart v. State

Supreme Court of Georgia · Decided June 30, 1976 · Jordan, Gunter, Ingram, Hill

227 S.E.2d 248; 237 Ga. 282; 1976 Ga. LEXIS 1231 (South Eastern Reporter, Second Series)

Cases that cite this one

3 later published cases cite this decision.

Perkins v. State (Ga. Ct. App. 1979)
Rodriguez v. Smith (District Court, S.D. New York 1977)
Johnson v. State (Ga. Ct. App. 1976)

This list shows which later cases cite this one. It does not say how they treated it, and no review of that has been done. Not a substitute for Shepard’s or KeyCite — verify before relying.

Opinion of the Court

Jordan, Justice.

Mike Cowart was convicted of criminal attempt to commit statutory rape, and his conviction was affirmed by the Court of Appeals. Cowart v. State, 136 Ga. App. 528 (221 SE2d 649) (1975). We granted certiorari to consider a burden-shifting charge by the trial judge on the appellant’s affirmative defense of abandonment of the effort to commit the crime. Code Ann. § 26-1003 (Ga. L. *2831968, pp. 1249, 1275). The trial judge instructed the jury that this defense must be made to appear by a preponderance of the evidence.

Argued April 12, 1976 Decided June 30, 1976 Rehearing denied July 14, 1976. . John W. Timmons, Jr., Jack H. Affleck, for appellant. Harry N. Gordon, District Attorney, B. Thomas Cook, Jr., Assistant District Attorney, for appellee.

hi State v. Moore, 237 Ga. 269 (1976), this court held that it was not error to give a similar charge on the affirmative defense of coercion, but that such a burden-shifting charge would not be approved in cases tried after the final date of that decision.

Judgment affirmed.

All the Justices concur, except Gunter, Ingram, and Hill, JJ., who dissent.

Dissenting Opinion

Hill, Justice,

dissenting.

I respectfully dissent. I would adopt the opinion of the Court of Appeals in Moore v. State, 137 Ga. App. 735 (224 SE2d 856) (1976).

I am authorized to state that Justice Ingram joins in this dissent.

Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.