State v. Davis

The defendant and the deceased, his wife, prior to 5 November, 1955, lived in a rural section of Burke County. At about 8:30 on the morning of that day the State’s witness Coleman went to the house where he found the defendant dressed and in the kitchen. The body of his wife was lying on her back in the bathroom near a pool of blood. The coroner, a physician, performed an autopsy and expressed the opinion that death resulted from “extensive bleeding in the chest cavity and on the outside tissue of the brain — produced by blunt force and blows about the face, head, and chest.” The coroner…