Charles Ughbanks v. Armstrong

• Decision Date: 24 February 1908
• Docket Number: No. 435,435
• Citation: 28 S.Ct. 372,52 L.Ed. 582,208 U.S. 481
• Parties: CHARLES UGHBANKS, Plff. in Err., v. A. N. ARMSTRONG, Warden of the State Prison at Jackson, Michigan
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

208 U.S. 481

28 S.Ct. 372

52 L.Ed. 582

CHARLES UGHBANKS, Plff. in Err.,

v A. N. ARMSTRONG, Warden of the State Prison at Jackson, Michigan.

No. 435.

Submitted January 20, 1908.

Decided February 24, 1908.

This writ of error brings up a judgment of the supreme court of Michigan, denying the application of the plaintiff in error for a writ of habeas corpus, to inquire into the cause of his detention in, and to obtain his discharge from, the state prison at Jackson.

It appears from the record that on the 17th of March, 1904, the plaintiff in error was proceeded against in the circuit court for the county of Washtenaw, in the state of Michigan, on an information filed by the prosecuting attorney for that county, charging the plaintiff in error with having committed the crime of burglary on the 15th of March, 1904. Upon being arraigned upon such information he pleaded guilty and was, on the day mentioned, sentenced under the indeterminate sentence act of the state to be confined in the state prison at Jackson at hard labor for a period not less than one year and not more than two years. Public Acts of Michigan, 1903, No. 136. His term of imprisonment, counting the maximum period for which he was sentenced, ended, as he asserts, on March 17, 1906, even without any deduction for good behavior.

In his petition for the writ, plaintiff in error stated that, by the record kept and retained by the warden of the Michigan state prison at Jackson, it appeared, as plaintiff in error was advised, that he had been twice before convicted of felony, and that he had served four years in Kingston, Canada, and four years in Jackson, Michigan, on account thereof, and that he was a resident of Canada, and had never resided in the state of Michigan or in the United States.

He made application at the end of the minimum term of his sentence to the advisory board, provided for by § 4 of the above act, for his discharge on parole, but he was notified that his application could not be heard or considered for the reason that it appeared that he had been twice before convicted of a felony, and the act provides that no person who has been twice previously convicted of a felony shall be eligible to parole.

After the expiration of the maximum term named in the sentence, being still detained in prison under the claim that the law provided a maximum term of imprisonment of five years in such a case as his, which term had not elapsed, the plaintiff in error applied to the supreme court of Michigan for a writ of habeas corpus to obtain his discharge, and, upon the denial of the application, brought the case here.

Messrs. John B. Chaddock and George E. Nichols for plaintiff in error.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 483-485 intentionally omitted] Messrs.John E. Bird and Henry E. Chase for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice Peckham, after making the foregoing statement, delivered the opinion of the court:

An act providing for an indeterminate sentence was first passed in Michigan in 1889, and was declared unconstitutional by the supreme court of that state. People v. Cummings, 88 Mich. 249, 14 L.R.A. 285, 50 N. W. 310. A constitutional amendment was subsequently adopted (1901), which authorized the legislature to provide for an indeterminate sentence law, as punishment for crime, on conviction thereof. Art. 4, § 47, Constitution of Michigan, as amended. Under the authority of this amendment the legislature, in 1903, passed act No. 136, of the Public Acts of that year. This act was held to be valid. Re Campbell, 138 Mich. 597, 101 N. W. 826; Re Duff, 141 Mich. 623, 105 N. W. 138. An act of a character very similar has been held to violate no provision of the Federal Constitution. Dreyer v. Illinois, 187 U. S. 71, 47 L. ed. 79, 23 Sup. Ct. Rep. 28. While the act in question here was in force, the crime of plaintiff in error was committed, and on the 17th of March, 1904, he was sentenced as already stated. The sentence fixed the maximum as well as the minimum term of imprisonment, but the fixing of the maximum term in the sentence has been held to be void, as not intended or authorized by the law of 1903 in any case where the statute providing for the punishment of a crime itself fixes the maximum term of imprisonment at a certain number of years. Re Compbell and Re Duff, supra.

In this case, where the maximum term for burglary is fixed by the statute at five years, the sentence fixing that term at two years was simply void, and the maximum term of imprisonment fixed by the statute takes the place of the maximum term fixed in the sentence. Re Campbell and Re Duff, supra. Under this construction the term of imprisonment of the plaintiff in error has not yet expired.

He cannot, however, avail himself of the provisions of the statute in relation to applying for and obtaining his discharge on parole, after the expiration of the minimum term of the sentence, because he has been convicted of two previous felonies.

In 1905 (Public Acts of Michigan, No. 184) the legislature passed another act on the same subject and repealed the act of 1903. The plaintiff in error contends that the provisions of the act of 1905 are more unfavorable to him than that of the act of 1903, and that it is invalid as to him because it is an ex post facto law, and, as the act of 1903 has been repealed, there is no act in force by which he can be further imprisoned.

Without stopping to inquire whether the act of 1905 would be, in his case, an ex post facto law, it may be stated that the supreme court of Michigan has held that the act of 1903 is not repealed as to those who were sentenced under it, and that, as to them, it is in full force, and the statute of 1905 has no application. Re Manaca, 146 Mich. 697, 110 N. W. 75. In such a case as this we follow that construction of the Constitution...