Davis v. State

This is an appeal from a judgment of the Circuit Court for Wicomico County under which the appellant was sentenced to a term of eighteen years after a jury verdict of second degree murder. The appellant contends that the trial court committed reversible error in its instructions to the jury that all homicides are presumed to be murder and that the burden is on the accused to show circumstances of alleviation, excuse or justification; that the appellant’s motion for acquittal filed at the close of the State’s case and again at the conclusion of all the testimony should have been granted; and…