Barron v. City of Anniston

• Decision Date: 17 December 1908
• Citation: 157 Ala. 399,48 So. 58
• Parties: BARRON v. CITY OF ANNISTON.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

48 So. 58

157 Ala. 399

BARRON v. CITY OF ANNISTON.

Supreme Court of Alabama

December 17, 1908

Appeal from City Court of Anniston; Thomas W. Coleman, Jr., Judge.

J. F Barron was convicted in the city court on appeal from the recorder's court, of violating an ordinance of the city of Anniston, and he appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Knox Acker & Blackmon, for appellant.

A. T Agee, for appellee.

SIMPSON J.

The appellant, after having been convicted before the recorder of the city of Anniston, appealed to the city court, and was tried in that court; the form of the action being a complaint claiming $500 on account of the violation of said city ordinance, and also claiming, in addition, that the defendant should be imprisoned for six months.

The witness Bryant, in describing his interview with the defendant, said that when he called him from his room he paid him for whisky he had bought that morning and told him he wanted another pint; and defendant moved to exclude that part of the testimony about paying for the whisky previously bought. There was no error in overruling said motion. The words objected to were a part of res gestæ, and to have stricken them out would have left the sentence without meaning.

The court erred in sustaining the objection to the question, by defendant's counsel to the witness Sweets, as to whether he had not taken enough interest in the prosecution of the defendant to follow the proceedings before Chancellor Whiteside on application to reduce bail. This question was asked on cross-examination, in which great latitude is allowed and the defendant was entitled to have all the facts brought out which might have any bearing on the animus of the witness to him. Beal v. State, 138 Ala. 94, 98, 35 So. 58.

If there was error in the refusal to allow the witness Yeatman to answer whether it was possible for any one to get into the defendant's room without passing through his, it was without injury, as the witness afterwards fully described the location of the rooms, from which the court could judge whether defendant's room could be otherwise reached.

The refusal to allow the wife of the defendant to testify in his behalf, and, on the other hand, the refusal to give the charge requested by the defendant as to reasonable doubt, bring up the main question in this case, to wit, the nature of the proceeding and the rules of evidence which should prevail. While the trial in the city court is de novo, yet it is still the same case, involving a prosecution for the violation of a city ordinance, and must be governed by the same rules as to the admission of evidence and the proof necessary for conviction. While there seems to be some confusion in the authorities generally as to the nature of such proceedings, a learned annotator suggests that when the proceeding relates to "private corporate purpose," or to the mere collection of a fine, civil proceedings would be proper; yet "considering it as an arm of the government, clothed with sovereign power and endowed with the function of enacting and enforcing laws for the preservation of the public peace and health, the protection of life and property, even to the limit of punishment by forfeiture and imprisonment for the public weal, debt and assumpsit seem alien and vain remedies, and nothing but criminal procedure suggests itself as proper and efficient." 28 Cyc. 781, and note 85.

Our own court, at an early day, held that proceedings for the recovery of fines and penalties are quasi criminal, and "should be conducted with greater regard to strictness than attaches to the pleadings in civil cases," and that the rules with regard to indictments for misdemeanors may with much propriety, be applied to them. Brown v. Mayor, etc., of Mobile, 23 Ala. 722, 724. Again, this court has said that proceedings for the violation of city ordinances are in no sense "civil causes," but are "punitive regulations," and "the object of a proceeding for the violation of them is not the redress for a civil injury, but the punishment of an offender against the peace and good order of society. Hence they are termed 'quasi criminal proceedings.' " Withers v. State ex rel., etc., 36 Ala. 252, 262. Based upon the reasoning of these cases, our court held (previous to the enactment of the statute au...