Cox v. State
| Decision Date | 12 March 1912 |
| Citation | 63 Fla. 12,58 So. 49 |
| Parties | COX v. STATE. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Error to Circuit Court, Dade County; L. W. Bethel, Judge.
P. C Cox was convicted as an accessory after the fact of murder and brings error. Reversed and remanded.
Syllabus by the Court
Where an indictment contains several distinct and separate counts a verdict of guilty, specifically confined to one count, is in law, an implied acquittal of the offenses charged in the other counts.
Where there is a criminal court of record in a county, the circuit court of that county has no trial jurisdiction of an indictment or a count of an indictment charging an offense not capital, or to render a judgment or sentence of conviction predicated upon an indictment or count charging an offense not capital.
Where, on a trial in the circuit court upon an indictment containing three counts, one of which counts charges an offense not capital, and a verdict of guilty is returned only as to the count that charges an offense not capital, the verdict operates as an acquittal on the other counts; and a sentence rendered upon such a verdict will be reversed, when there is a criminal court of record in the county, since the latter court alone would have jurisdiction to try 'criminal cases not capital which shall arise in' the county.
Section 3192, Gen. St. 1906, should be construed with reference to the constitutional jurisdiction of courts.
COUNSEL Price & Railey and H. P. Branning, for plaintiff in error.
Park Trammell, Atty. Gen., and C. O. Andrews, for the State.
P. C. Cox was tried in the circuit court for Dade county upon an indictment consisting of three separate and distinct counts. The first count charged murder in the first degree; the second count charged an unlawful aiding and procuring of murder; the third count charged accessory after the fact of murder. The defendant was convicted on the third count. A motion in arrest of judgment was denied. The defendant took writ of error.
Where an indictment contains several distinct and separate counts, a verdict of guilty, specifically confined to one count, is, in law, an implied acquittal of the offenses charged in the other counts. Johnson v. State, 58 Fla. 68, 50 So. 529; Smith v. State, 40 Fla. 203, 23 So. 854; Green v. State, 17 Fla. 669.
A ground of the motion in arrest of judgment is that the third count of the indictment, on which alone the defendant was convicted, does not charge a capital offense, and, as there is a criminal court of record in Dade county, the circuit judge had no jurisdiction to try the defendant for the offense charged in the count on which he was convicted.
The Constitution provides that 'the circuit courts shall have exclusive original jurisdiction * * * of all criminal cases not cognizable by inferior courts.' 'There shall be established in the county of Escambia, and upon application of a majority of the registered voters in such other counties as the Legislature may deem expedient, a criminal court of record.' 'The said courts shall have jurisdiction of all criminal cases not capital...
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Mizell v. State
...States, 170 U. S. 402, 18 Sup. Ct. 624, 42 L. Ed. 1085; Dealy v. United States, 152 U. S. 539, 14 Sup. Ct. 680, 38 L. Ed. 545; Cox v. State, 63 Fla. 12, 58 South. 49; People v. Weil, 243 Ill. 208, 90 N. E. 731, 134 Am. St. Rep. 357; Ford v. State, 79 Neb. 309, 112 N. W. 606; State v. McAnal......
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Donaldson v. Sack
...1078 (1900); Rakes v. United States, 212 U.S. 55, 29 S.Ct. 244, 53 L.Ed. 401 (1909). Our own Court in the early case of Cox v. State, 63 Fla. 12, 15, 58 So. 49, 50 (1912), citing the relevant provisions of our constitution and statutes 'Under the above-quoted provisions of the organic law, ......
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Coston v. State
...the contention that the court was without jurisdiction to try defendant on indictment containing a count charging an offense not capital. The Cox case is to be differentiated from this In that case the indictment was in three counts. The first count charged murder in the first degree. The s......