United States v. Holt
| Decision Date | 04 March 1909 |
| Docket Number | 1,682. |
| Citation | 168 F. 141 |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Western District of Washington |
| Parties | UNITED STATES v. HOLT. |
Elmer E. Todd, U.S. Dist. Atty.
Caldwell & Riddell, for defendant.
The defendant, having been indicted for the crime of murder committed at the Ft. Worden military post, after a motion to quash the indictment had been denied and a demurrer had been overruled, entered a plea of 'not guilty,' and after a trial the jury returned a verdict finding him guilty as charged, 'without capital punishment.' His counsel have interposed in his behalf three motions, viz.: A motion to summon the jurors for examination in open court for the purpose of eliciting facts impeaching the verdict; a motion in arrest of judgment; a motion for a new trial.
The first of the three motions is upon the ground that the trial was prolonged through a number of days, and at each adjournment and recess of the court, previous to the final submission of the case to the jury, the jurors were permitted to separate, and they were free to read, and did read, the daily newspapers in which the case was referred to and commented upon, in a manner prejudicial to the defendant's case. An affidavit in support of the motion alleges that, several days after the verdict had been returned, one of the jurors admitted having had a conversation at his home with a hired man, in which the trial was mentioned. The juror referred to has made a counteraffidavit explaining that the conversation with his hired man was had after the verdict had been returned, and alleging that during the time the case was on trial he did not have any conversation with any person whomsoever in which the case was mentioned.
It is the opinion of the court that the defendant has had a fair trial by a jury composed of fair-minded, intelligent, honest men, and it will not be presumed that they were influenced in making their decision, by the newspapers. Previous to the arguments made to the jury, the court cited one of the reporters, and in the presence of the jury interrogated him concerning a published article referring to the case, which the jurors necessarily knew was inaccurate, and elicited from him an admission that he was the author of it, and that he had been misinformed in regard to some of the facts; and thereupon the court admonished and advised the jurors to be careful to not give heed to unreliable statements published by the papers, and on each occasion of adjournment the court admonished the jurors to refrain from talking about the case or any subject connected with it, either with each other or with any person, and to not listen to anything which might be said about the case out of court, and to not have any communication on any subject whatever with the parties witnesses, or attorneys in the case, and to avoid, as far as possible, receiving any impression as to the merits of the case other than what should be made upon their minds by the proceedings on the trial. There is no reasonable ground for supposing that either of the jurors failed to faithfully observe these instructions. I do not entertain even a suspicion of wrongdoing on the part of either of the jurors therefore I am unwilling to insult them by instituting the inquisition proposed.
It is not good practice to admit the testimony of jurors to impeach a verdict rendered conformably to law, and it would not tend to promote the ends of justice to permit a defendant who has been convicted of a heinous crime to turn the tables by putting his triers on trial, on a mere hope of success in an undertaking to extort from them admissions to prove that the verdict may have been based upon prejudice, and not upon the fact of his guilt proved by the testimony of witnesses.
The motion in arrest of judgment challenges the jurisdiction of the court, the sufficiency of the indictment, and the competency of the evidence upon which it was founded. The specific ground for disputing the jurisdiction of the court will be considered in disposing of the third motion. No flaw in the indictment has been pointed out, nor discovered by the court. As to the remaining ground, it would be sufficient to say that the court does not know what evidence was submitted to the grand jury; but I will make an additional explanation: By the motion to quash the indictment, an attempt was made to show that incompetent evidence in the nature of a confession by the defendant was received and considered by the grand jury, and the present motion is a renewal of that attempt. Such evidence was offered on the trial, and it was excluded by the court; nevertheless, the evidence admitted by the court convinced the trial jury of the defendant's guilt, and it is the opinion of the court that it was amply sufficient to justify the verdict. As the names of the witnesses who testified on the trial are indorsed upon the indictment, there is a necessary presumption that the grand jury was informed by legal evidence of the important facts, and that, if no evidence except that which the court deems competent had been submitted, a true bill would have been founded upon it. It is not the province of the grand jury to pass upon the ultimate question of the guilt or innocence of an accused person. While that body is engaged in the investigation of his case, he is not permitted to be present, nor can his counsel participate in sifting the evidence then. There is no way provided for a review of the evidence elicited upon the preliminary and secret investigation of a case by a grand jury in its entirety, nor will a court permit itself to become involved in endless entanglements by considering affidavits presenting mere fragments of it. Hence all questions as to the relevancy, competency, and sufficiency of the evidence must be determined upon the trial of the case, after a plea of not guilty. It is only in rare instances, when a court is convinced by a showing of facts that the grand jury has been used as an instrument of persecution, or that fundamental principles of jurisprudence have been disregarded in the proceedings of the grand jury, e.g., by compelling an accused person to appear and give incriminating testimony against himself, or where the grand jury was not composed of qualified persons, that a court will set aside an indictment for reasons not apparent on the face of the record. Wharton's Crim. Pl. & Pr. (9th Ed.) Secs. 363-388; 10 Enc.of Pl. & Pr.p. 569; U.S. v. Terry (D.C.) 39 F. 355.
An instructive opinion on this branch of the law was rendered by Judge Whitson in the case of the United States v. Wells (D.C.) 163 F. 313 .
The indictment charged a number of persons with criminal conspiracy, some of whom had been compelled to testify before the grand jury and were subjected to brow-beating cross-examinations. There was a quest for big game, and a United States senator was included among those indicted. He had been acquitted by a jury on a trial before Judge Whitson, and, referring to him in the opinion, the judge said:
'The court has occasion to know that there was no ground for the return of the indictment as to one of the defendants, for it must be assumed that the same evidence was adduced upon the trial that was offered to the grand jury.'
The indictment was assailed by pleas interposed by some of the defendants, the opinion sustaining the pleas rests upon substantial grounds, and it does not oppose the general proposition that an exception to a good indictment returned by a lawful grand jury appeals to the sound discretion of the court, and the justice of the case rather than mere technical grounds of objection should be the basis of the court's decision. In that view, the court denied the defendant's motion to quash the indictment, and his motion in arrest of judgment will also be denied.
The grounds for a new trial assigned in the third motion are: (1) Irregularities in the proceedings by which the defendant was prevented from having a fair trial. (2) Misconduct of the jury. (3) Insufficiency of the evidence to prove a crime cognizable in this court. (4) Misconduct of the United States attorney. (5) Errors in the rulings of the court during the progress of the trial and in the instructions to the jury, and in refusing instructions requested in behalf of the defendant.
I believe that the trial was fair, that neither the jury nor the United States attorney were guilty of any misconduct, that no error prejudicial to the defendant occurred, and that a second trial would not result in a verdict more favorable to him. The only points raised by the motion which, in my estimation, are of sufficient importance to require an opinion in writing, are those which challenge the jurisdiction of the court and the regularity of the proceedings.
To decide the question as to the jurisdiction of the court, it is necessary to determine three subsidiary questions, viz First. At what place was the murder committed? Second. Is that place within the boundaries of a fort over which the government of the United States...
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May v. United States
...States, 1942, 315 U.S. 60, 62 S.Ct. 457, 86 L.Ed. 680, cited by appellants, supports the rules as we state them. 41 United States v. Holt, C.C.W.D. Wash.1909, 168 F. 141, affirmed 1910, 218 U.S. 245, 31 S.Ct. 2, 54 L.Ed. 1021; McDonald v. Pless, 1915, 238 U.S. 264, 35 S.Ct. 783, 59 L.Ed. 13......
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...against the defendant. The court below refused to quash the indictment and denied a motion in arrest of judgment. United States v. Holt, 168 F. 141 (W.D.Wash. 1909). The Supreme Court refused to reverse, "Without considering how far, if at all, the court is warranted in inquiring into the n......
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...under the conditions of the present day." Holt v. United States, 218 U.S. 245, 251, 31 S.Ct. 2, 54 L.Ed. 1021 (1910), affirming 168 F. 141 (C.C.W.D. Wash.1909). It is the Court's considered view that this jury was a fair and impartial one and in no way tainted by the publicity which accompa......
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...unless such testimony was the only testimony considered by them. The case of Holt v. United States, 218 U.S. 245, affirming U. S. v. Holt, 168 F. 141, supports doctrine laid down by our supreme court in the case of Baldwin v. State, supra. Lee v. State (Tex.), 40 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1032. The ......