Commonwealth v. Lobel

• Decision Date: 07 January 1905
• Citation: 187 Mass. 288,72 N.E. 977
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. LOBEL.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

187 Mass. 288

72 N.E. 977

COMMONWEALTH v. LOBEL.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

January 7, 1905

COUNSEL

M. J. Sughrue, First Asst. Dist. Atty., for the Commonwealth.

Cutler & James, for defendant.

OPINION

KNOWLTON C.J.

The defendant was tried in the superior court and found guilty of a criminal offense, and exceptions were taken to rulings made at the trial. Afterwards he was sentenced, and execution of the sentence was stayed, upon motion by an order of the court, before any part of it had been executed. The exceptions were entered in the Supreme Judicial Court, but were afterwards waived, and thereupon a rescript was sent to the superior court accordingly. The defendant then filed a motion for revision of the sentence, which motion was denied on the ground that the court had no power to grant it. An exception to this ruling presents the only question before us.

The case of Com. v. O'Brien, 175 Mass. 38, 55 N.E 466, goes far towards a determination of this question. It was held in that case, after the disposition of the exceptions in the Supreme Judicial Court, when the case came before the superior court for an order vacating the original order staying the execution of the sentence, that it was in the power of the court to revise the sentence for the correction of an error of law. The case of Com v. Hayes, 170 Mass. 16, 48 N.E. 779, was considered, and limited to the precise point decided in it. It was said that 'the power of the court to deal with a sentence, whenever the exceptions are overruled, so far as to vacate the order staying execution, and to direct enforcement of it, impliedly includes the power to correct any illegality or error in a sentence, provided it then remains wholly unexecuted.' There is no good ground for a distinction between the power to correct an error of law and the power to correct an error of fact. Under the present practice, which makes it the duty of the court in criminal cases to impose a sentence after a verdict of guilty, notwithstanding exceptions, the imposition of a sentence in a case in which exceptions are pending is not a final decision of the case, as the imposition of a sentence was under the former law, in a case in which there were no exceptions. Formerly a prisoner could not be sentenced so long as exceptions remained undisposed of, and when a case was ripe for a sentence and the sentence was imposed, and the term of the...