Edwards v. State
Tennessee Supreme Court
202 Tenn. 393 (1957)
- Written by Kelli Lanski, JD
Facts
A Tennessee highway patrolman was killed after James Edwards (defendant) hit him while driving drunk. At the time, the patrolman was on the side of a busy road performing a traffic stop on another driver. Edwards, traveling at around 50 to 60 miles per hour, scraped the other driver’s car, which hit the patrolman, killing him. A second officer followed Edwards and forced him off the road, at which time that officer observed that Edwards was very intoxicated. When police officers came to Edwards’s home the next day to interview him, Edwards’s wife said she had told him the night before to stop driving but he refused. Edwards admitted to police that he was aware he had hit something in the road but chose not to stop his car. The state (plaintiff) charged Edwards with second-degree murder. At trial, Edwards asked the judge to instruct the jury that he could not be convicted of second-degree murder because he was too drunk to know what he was doing and had not acted with the requisite malice. The judge rejected Edwards’s proposed jury instruction, and Edwards was convicted of second-degree murder. Edwards appealed.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Tomlinson, J.)
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