State v. Fuqua

Appellant assigns as error the ruling of the court below that the confession allegedly made by defendant to officer Cook was voluntary.

“When the State proposes to offer in evidence the defendant’s confession or admission, and the defendant objects, the proper procedure is for the trial judge to excuse the jury and, in its absence, hear the evidence, both that of the State and that of the defendant, upon the question of the voluntariness of the statement. In the light of such evidence and of his observation of the demeanor of the witnesses, the judge must resolve the question of whether the…