Mason v. State

HARPER, Judge.

Appellant was prosecuted and convicted of murder and his punishment assessed at five years confinement in the State penitentiary.

The court’s charge in this case is severely criticized in the motion for a new trial. In the first place the court in defining murder said: “Murder is distinguishable from every other species of homicide by the absence of circumstances which reduce the offense to negligent homicide or which excuse or justify the homicide.” This definition is not the law where the issue of manslaughter is presented by the testimony. In this ease the court recognized…