Coakley v. State (Majority, with Dissenting)
Annotate this Case
The Supreme Court affirmed Defendant's conviction of murder in the first degree, holding that there was no prejudicial error in the proceedings below.
Specifically, the Court held that the trial court (1) did not err by denying Defendant's motion for directed verdict because there was sufficient evidence that Defendant acted with the purpose of causing the death of the victim; (2) did not abuse its discretion in allowing testimony over Defendant's objection involving prior incidents unrelated to the night of the charged murder; and (3) did not err in refusing Defendant's motion for a jury instruction on justification for manslaughter because the jury never considered manslaughter.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.