Beville v. State

• Decision Date: 12 June 1911
• Citation: 55 So. 854,61 Fla. 8
• Parties: BEVILLE v. STATE.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

55 So. 854

61 Fla. 8

BEVILLE v. STATE.

Florida Supreme Court, Division B.

June 12, 1911

Error to Circuit Court, Sumter County; W. S. Bullock, Judge.

John Beville was convicted of murder in the third degree, and brings error. Affirmed.

Syllabus by the Court

SYLLABUS

Under the provisions of section 1805, General Statutes of 1906, the regular terms of the several circuit courts are required to be at the county seats of the respective counties. A county seat or county town is the chief town of a county, where the county buildings and courts are located and county business transacted. The particular building at or in the county seat or town in which the court is held does not enter into the court's proceedings as a factor as to their validity, so long as such building is located at the county seat or town. It is usual and best to have a regular courthouse at the county seat for the holding of courts, etc.; but, if the county is temporarily without a regular courthouse, the courts may be regularly held in any building, or even in a tent, at the county seat.

Under the provisions of section 1579, General Statutes of 1906 where the judge for any cause shall quash the panel of grand jurors summoned to serve at a term of court, he has full power to have a new panel drawn, either from the jury box or from the body of the county at large, and any proper indictment found by such grand jury will be upheld.

An assignment of error that is not argued in the briefs of counsel, the only mention of which in the briefs is a statement that it will be argued orally, will be treated as abandoned.

COUNSEL Thomas Palmer, J. C. B. Koonce, and J. H. Jones for plaintiff in error.

Park Trammell, Atty. Gen., for the State.

OPINION

TAYLOR J.

The plaintiff in error, John Beville, under an indictment charging him with murder in the first degree, was tried and convicted of murder in the third degree in the circuit court of Sumter county, and seeks reversal of the judgment and sentence imposed by writ of error.

The defendant pleaded in abatement to the indictment on the ground that the grand jury that found the indictment had been illegally summoned and impaneled. The following facts appear from the minutes of the court embodied in the plea in abatement as a part thereof:

The court convened at the time fixed by law for the fall term in said county at the county site in the town of Sumterville but the court was held in a building not the regular courthouse, in which building the grand and petit jurors were drawn for that term of the court, and in which building said grand jury returned an indictment against the defendant charging this same offense, but to this indictment the state's attorney confessed a plea in abatement predicated on the holding of the court in the wrong building. Whereupon the court quashed said indictment, and the grand jury that returned it, and moved over into another building at said county site, designated by the county commissioners as the place to hold the term of court, and in said new building continued the holding of said term, and there issued a venire for 36 persons, to be drawn from the body of the county at large, to serve as grand and petit jurors at that term of the court, and from such 36 jurors so drawn the court drew 18 names to serve as a grand jury, and this grand jury presented the indictment assailed by this plea. To this plea the state's attorney interposed a demurrer, which was sustained by the court, and this ruling constitutes the first assignment of error. It is contended here that the term of the court at which this indictment was presented did not commence until the 4th day of November, 1909, when the court removed into the new building from the old one in which the term was first begun to be held, which date was several days after the date fixed by law for the beginning of said term, and that it was therefore, in effect a special term of the court, and that the judge had no authority to draw a grand jury from the body of the county at large for such special term, and that, therefore, the grand jury that found this indictment was illegal. There is no merit in this contention, and the court below committed no error in sustaining the state's demurrer to these pleas in abatement. Section 1805 of the General Statutes of 1906 provides that: 'The regular term of the several circuit courts shall be held at the county seats of the respective counties.' A county seat or county town is the chief town of a county, where the county buildings and courts are located and county business...