Commonwealth v. Mitchell

• Decision Date: 07 December 1867
• Citation: 66 Ky. 25
• Parties: Commonwealth v. Mitchell.
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals

66 Ky. 25

Commonwealth v. Mitchell.

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

December 7, 1867

1. Extortion, which is an offense at common law, is defined to be an abuse of public justice, which consists in any officer's unlawfully taking, by color of his office, from any man, any money or thing of value that is not due him, or more than is due him, or before it is due--the punishment for which is fine and imprisonment, and sometimes a forfeiture of the office. (4 Blackstone, 141.)

2. An indictment charging the defendant, a jailer, with the offense of extortion, by willfully and corruptly compelling a prisoner to pay him money to which he was not entitled-- held to be good, and that the facts set forth were sufficient to constitute the offense charged.

3. If the marshal brought the prisoner to the jailer without an order of commitment, he should not have received him; and it was his duty to have discharged him at once without demanding or receiving any money or thing of value from him whatever therefor.

APPEAL FROM DAVIESS CIRCUIT COURT.

JOHN RODMAN, Attorney General, For Appellant,

CITED--

Rev. Stat., sec. 2, art. 16, chap. 28, 1 Stant, 396.

OPINION

PETERS CHIEF JUSTICE.

The grand jury of Daviess county found an indictment against appellee for extortion, committed substantially as follows That one O'Bryan was arrested by the marshal of the city of Owensboro for being intoxicated, swearing, and otherwise misbehaving, and was delivered to appellee as jailer of Daviess county, to be confined in the jail of said county until the day following, and then and there to be tried by the city judge for the offenses charged against him; that he was committed about 6 o'clock in the evening and detained until 10 P. M., when appellee willfully and corruptly compelled said O'Bryan to pay him five dollars charged as his fee for receiving and detaining him in the jail as aforesaid, which sum he collected, and then and there corruptly and voluntarily set him at liberty, and permitted him to depart; said appellee then being the jailer of said county.

To the indictment a demurrer was sustained, and the Commonwealth has appealed.

Extortion which is an offense at common law, is defined to be an abuse of public justice, which consists in any officer's unlawfully taking, by color of his office, from any man, any money or thing of value that is not due him, or more than is due, or before it is due--the punishment...