Commonwealth v. Battis
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
The defendant, John Battis, a negro of about twenty years of age, was indicted for the murder of one Salome Talbot, a white girl of the age of thirteen years, on the twenty-eighth day of June last. The indictment contained three counts. The 1st count charged the killing to have been with a stone, with which he beat and broke her skull, &c.
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The defendant, John Battis, a negro of about twenty years of age, was indicted for the murder of one Salome Talbot, a white girl of the age of thirteen years, on the twenty-eighth day of June last. The indictment contained three counts. The 1st count charged the killing to have been with a stone, with which he beat and broke her skull, &c. The 2d stated that the killing was by drowning; and the 3d charged the killing to have been by beating and breaking her skull with a stone, and throwing her body into the water, and suffocating and drowning. There was another indictment against the prisoner…
1Opinion of the Court
The Court informed him of the consequence of his plea, e nd that he was under no legal or moral * obligation to plead guilty; but that he had a right to deny the several charges, and put the government to the proof of them. He would not retract his pleas; whereupon the Court told him that they would allow him a reasonable time to consider of what had been said to him: and remanded him to prison. They directed the dtrk not to record his pleas, at present.
In the afternoon of the same day, the prisoner was again set to the bar, and the indictment for murder was once more read to him; he again…
2Cited by3 opinions
- Shailer v. BumsteadMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · 1868
- Armstrong v. FarrarSupreme Court of Missouri · 1844
- Den v. VancleveSupreme Court of New Jersey · 1819