State v. Oakes

For error in the course of the trial of this case in Superior Court, as revealed on the face of the case on appeal, this Court is impelled, ex mero motu, to order a new trial. S. v. McCoy, 236 N.C. 121, 71 S.E. 2d 921, and numerous other cases of like import.

The error arises in this manner. The trial judge correctly charged that where a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree shall have been reached by the jury, it has the unbridled discretionary right to recommend that the punishment for the crime shall be imprisonment for life in the State’s Prison,- — instructing the jury that…