State v. Stafford

• Decision Date: 22 January 1931
• Docket Number: 79.
• Citation: 153 A. 77,160 Md. 385
• Parties: STATE EX REL. WILSON v. STAFFORD, JUSTICE OF THE PEACE.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

153 A. 77

160 Md. 385

STATE EX REL. WILSON v. STAFFORD, JUSTICE OF THE PEACE.

No. 79.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

January 22, 1931

Appeal from Circuit Court, Kent County; Lewin W. Wickes, Judge.

Certiorari proceeding by the State, on the relation of Baynard Wilson against Olin B. Stafford, Justice of the Peace. From an order quashing the writ, relator appeals.

Reversed and remanded.

Argued before BOND, C.J., and PATTISON, URNER, ADKINS, OFFUTT PARKE, and SLOAN, JJ.

G. L Pendleton of Baltimore, for appellant.

William L. Marbury, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen. (Stephen R. Collins, State's Atty., of Chestertown, on the brief), for appellee.

PARKE J.

On July 14, 1930, Baynard Wilson filed in the circuit court for Kent county a petition for a writ of certiorari to be issued directing that Olin B. Stafford, a justice of the peace of that county, produce his record of the criminal prosecution and judgment against the petitioner in June, 1930. The petition embodied the docket entries, which, omitting the titling, were as follows:

"Before Olin B. Stafford, Justice of the Peace, upon oath and aformation rec'd., J. Thomas Hadaway who charges Baynard Wilson with on the 9th day of April, 1930, in the 3rd Election District of Kent County. d. with assault and battery on Roy Silcox, contrary to law. Trial held June 4, 1930 Plead Guilty. Sentenced to Maryland House of Correction for Nine Months from this date June 4th, 1930. As witness my hand and seal this June 4, 1930.

Olin B. Stafford, J. P. [ Seal.]

Commitme issued June 12, 1930. Appeal noted to October Court 1930 by G. L. Pendleton, Att. Bail $500.

Olin B. Stafford, J. P.

I hereby certify that the above is a true copy as taken from my Docket.

Olin B. Stafford, J. P."

The petition is quite cruedly and inartificially drawn, and the only allegation which need be stated is that the docket entries do not affirmatively disclose that the traverser was informed of his right to trial by jury and elected to be tried before the justice of the peace. Upon this verified petition the court directed the writ to issue and set the matter for hearing on a named hour and day. There was neither return nor answer by the magistrate, and on the day set for the hearing the respondent made a motion short to amend the docket entries which was followed by a motion on the part of the respondent to quash the writ; and then the petitioner moved short to quash the proceedings before the justice of the peace. A hearing was had and the court overruled the two motions, which were not in writing and present no question for review; and granted the respondent's motion in writing to quash the writ of certiorari. It was from the order quashing the writ that this appeal was taken.

When the prisoner was brought before the justice of the peace charged with an assault and battery, the justice had no jurisdiction to hear, try, and determine the case unless "the accused, when brought before any such Justice, on being informed by him of his right to trial by jury, freely elects to be tried before such Justice." Baum v. Warden of Jail, 110 Md. 579, 583-586, 73 A. 294; Danner v. State, 89 Md. 220, 228, 42 A. 965. Code, art. 52, § 12. The jurisdictional fact that the traverser was informed of his right to a trial by jury and his free election to be tried before the justice must affirmatively appear in the record of the proceedings. Fitzwater v. Youghiogheny, etc., Corp., 149 Md. 461, 470, 131 A. 776; Smith v. Goldsborough, 80 Md. 49, 59, 30 A. 574; Cumberland Valley R. Co. v. Martin, 100 Md. 165, 166, 59 A. 714, et infra.

The rule is thus stated for the court by Judge Offutt in Kartman v. Miliman, 144 Md. 502, 505-506, 125 A. 170, 171: "In the case of inferior courts sitting in the exercise of a special and limited jurisdiction, such as that exercised by magistrates under the laws of this state, it is well settled that--'There must be affirmative proof in support of the regularity of the proceedings. It is said that "no principle of law is more evident than that, when the tribunal is of a limited jurisdiction, or the proceedings are particularly described by a statute made on the subject, that course of procedure, so described, must, on the face of the record, appear to have been, if not literally, at least substantially, complied with, or the case must by the proceedings disclose itself to be within the limited jurisdiction. ' Shivers v. Wilson, 5 Har. & J. 132 ; Owings v. Worthington, 10 Gill & J. 293.' Fahey v. Mottu, 67 Md. 250, 10 A. 68." Dorsey v. Dorsey, 28 Md. 388, 394; Wickes' Lessee v. Caulk, 5 Har. & J. 36, 42; Boarman v. Patterson, 1 Gill, 372, 381.

The petition alleges that the justice of the peace had no jurisdiction, because he had failed to proceed in accordance with the provisions of the statute, and the entries of the proceedings before the justice of the peace, which are incorporated in full in the petition, show a failure on the part of the magistrate to inform the accused of his right to trial by jury and an election to be tried before the justice of the peace. At the hearing no amendment was made of these entries, nor any testimony offered, so the record wholly fails to disclose that the prisoner was informed of this right and thereafter made his election to be tried by the magistrate. The absence of a compliance with this indispensable prerequisite to the jurisdiction of the justice of the peace to proceed was, therefore, manifest by the record, and the want of jurisdiction so appearing on the face of the proceedings whatever was thereafter done was coram non judice and void, whether it was a plea of guilty, and judgment or a trial followed by a verdict and judgment. Baum v. Warden of Jail, 110 Md. 579, 583-586, 73 A. 294; Danner v. State, 89 Md. 220, 228, 229, 42 A. 965; Green v. State, 113 Md. 451, 455-458, 77 A. 677; Kane v. State, 70 Md. 546-553, 17 A. 557; State v. Ward, 95 Md. 118, 123, 51 A. 848; Fahey v. Mottu, 67 Md. 250, 255, 10 A. 68.

A writ of certiorari is available to test the jurisdiction of the inferior tribunal, and, so, when the court had directed the writ to issue in the cause and proceeded to a hearing on the motion of the respondent to quash the writ, the proceedings then at bar did not disclose the facts which were essential to the jurisdiction of the justice of the peace, an inferior tribunal, and the trial court should not have granted the motion quashing the writ. Weed v. Lewis, 80 Md. 126 129, 30 A. 610; Riggs v. Green, 118 Md. 218, 225, 84 A. 343; Kane v. State, 70 Md. 546, 552, 17 A. 557. If, upon answer or other procedure, it should subsequently be found that the allegations of the petition are untrue and the docket entries of the magistrate incomplete, and that, as a matter of fact, the accused was duly advised of his right to trial by jury, and freely elected to proceed before the justice of the peace, a different situation would be presented for the circuit...