Murphy v. United States

BUFFINGTON, Circuit Judge.

While it took three days to try this case, and many substantial questions were involved, no error is now alleged save a single sentence of the charge as to a reasonable doubt which reads, “ ‘Reasonable doubt’ means a doubt for which some sound reason can he assigned in your minds.” Standing by itself and removed from the context, these words might possibly be open to'the objection raised in some adjudged cases that a doubt to be reasonable must be one which the juror must be able to justify in the regard of others. But when the instruction in that regard1 (printed in…