Groves v. The State Of Ga.
| Decision Date | 30 September 1884 |
| Citation | 73 Ga. 205 |
| Parties | Groves. vs. The State of Georgia. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
Criminal Law. Malpractice. Indictment. Presentment. Jury and Jurors. Before Judge Estes. Habersham Superior Court. March Term, 1884.
To the report contained in the decision it is only necessary to add that the grand jury presented Groves, the ordinary, for malpractice in office. The presentment contained several counts, which charged the defendant respectively with failing to make his returns to the grand jury, with failing to bring the county taxes collected to a settlement, with issuing orders, knowing that the county did not owe the payee, and with passing and carrying into effect an order that the jury certificates, orders, old tax fi fas. and accounts which had collected in the ordinary\'s office should be burned, in order to make room for others. On the back of this presentment was endorsed a list of the witnesses and an entry signed by the solicitor general that he had served the defendant " personally with a copy of this indictment and a list of witnesses before the same was sent before or acted upon by the grand jury." This was demurred to, on the ground that the defendant could not be tried for malpractice on a presentment, but only on an indictment preferred by a prosecutor and found by the grand jury.
The demurrer was overruled, and defendant excepted.
Barrow & Thomas; Crane & Jones; C. H. Sutton; S. M. Smith; H. S. West, for plaintiff in error.
Wm. S. Erwin, solicitor general, by Dunlap & Thompson; Claud Estes, for the state.
By special presentment of the grand jury, the plaintiff in error was charged with the offense of malpractice in office, in several counts therein specified. It was entered on the presentment by the solicitor general that the defendant was " served personally with a copy of this indictment and list of witnesses before the same was sent before or acted on by the grand jury."
The defendant to this accusation demurred to the same, on the ground that he cannot be held to answer said charge upon a presentment of a grand jury, but can be held liable to answer said charge only on an indictment preferred by a prosecutor, and found true by a grand jury." The court below overruled this demurrer, and this is the judgment assigned for error.
By the 4632d section of the Code, it is enacted that" all special presentments by the grand juries of this state; charging the defendants with violations of the penal laws, shall be treated as indictments, and it shall not be necessary for the clerk to enter such presentments in full upon the minutes, but only the statement of the case and finding of the grand jury, as in cases of indictments; nor shall it be necessary for the solicitor general to frame bills of indictment on such presentments, but he may arraign defendants upon such presentments, and put them upon trial in like manner as if the same were bills of indictment. By the 4504th section of the Code, it is enacted that"any ordinary, or member of any board of commissioners, or county judge, or justice of the peace, who shall be charged with malpractice in office, etc.,... may be indicted, which indictment shall specially set forth the merits of the complaint, and a copy thereof be served on the defendant before the same is laid before the grand jury; and the prosecutor and the justice, and their witnesses, shall have the right of appearing and being heard before the grand jury, which indictment, if found true by the grand jury, shall, as in other cases, be tried by petit jury; and if the defendant be convicted, he shall be punished, etc."
This defendant was proceeded against precisely as required by the above 4504th section, and given...
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Taylor v. State
...the laws which they may know to have been committed at any previous time, which are not barred by the statute of limitations." In Groves v. State, 73 Ga. 208, the Supreme Court said: "Can it be possible that a grand juror, sworn under section 3915 of the Code, 'diligently to inquire and tru......
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Taylor v. State
...know to have been committed at any previous time, which are not barred by the statute of limitations." The decision in the case of Groves v. State, 73 Ga. 205, as quoted in the majority opinion, carries no that the state would be bound by the private knowledge of a single grand juror as to ......
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Barlow v. State
...the accusation is presented by a prosecutor, and in a special presentment it is preferred by the grand jury without a prosecutor. Groves v. State, 73 Ga. 205. The form is substantially the same, whether the grand jury indicts or presents. Pen. Code 1895, § 929; Foster v. State, 41 Ga. 582. ......
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Barlow v. State
...the accusation is presented by a prosecutor, and in a special presentment it is preferred by the grand jury without a prosecutor. Groves v. State, 73 Ga. 205. The form substantially the same, whether the grand jury indicts or presents. Pen. Code 1895, § 929; Foster v. State, 41 Ga. 582. Spe......