State v. Briley

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Francis, J.

Defendant John Lee Briley was charged by indictment with the murder of Benjamin Reaves, Jr. and with the commission of an atrocious assault and battery upon Paulette Briley, defendant’s wife. Since the offenses arose out of a single event, they were joined in individual counts of one indictment. Defendant’s pretrial motion to sever the counts and to try them separately was denied. A jury trial resulted in a conviction of manslaughter and atrocious assault and battery, followed by imposition of concurrent sentences of 7 to 10 years…