State v. Bacon

[1, 2] The charge in this case being murder, the attorney for accused admitted in his argument to the jury that the accused was guilty of murder, but argued that there were extenuating circumstances, and urged the jury to add to their verdict the qualification “without capital punishment.” In his closing argument the district attorney said to the jury:

“That you can qualify your verdict does not mean that you are to arbitrarily disregard your oath.”

Counsel for accused made objection to that statement as implying that by qualifying their verdict the jury would be disregarding their oaths.…