Raleigh, Dec. 15—Governor Morrison this afternoon commuted the death sentence of Jerry Dalton, youthful Macon county murderer, to not less than 20 nor more than 30 years in the state prison.
Jerry’s commutation is the result of the Governor’s conviction that the murder done by the ignorant drunken mountain lad was not deliberate and premeditated, but the result of a quarrel between him and a neighbor youth over a girl. The girl in the case was also killed, but the witnesses who testified in contradiction of Jerry’s statement that her death was an accident were confused in cross-examination.
It has been evident for several days that the governor would commute. He had Jerry brought over to the mansion from the penitentiary last Sunday, saw the prisoner’s lawyers on the following day, and had his attention called to the charge by the jury by Judge Bryson, who failed, it appears, to properly distinguish between murder in the first and second degree to the decided impairment of Dalton’s chances.
The governor has conferred during the week with Attorney General Manning, associate Justice Koke of the supreme court, and Judge Henry G. Connor, all of whom agree with him in his conclusions.
. . . .
“I do not believe the killing took place while Dalton’s blood was cool, and his mind in a condition to form a deliberate intent to commit murder in the first degree, according to the evidence in the case. For this reason, and out of respect to the petition filed from 10 of the jurors who convicted him, and out of respect to the thousands of petitioners in the state who asked for a commutation of his sentence.
“I hereby commute the sentence of Jerry Dalton from death by electrocution to an indeterminate sentence of not less than 20 years and not more than 30 years in the state’s prison.”
. . . .
From the front page of the Durham Morning Herald, Sunday, Dec. 16, 1923
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