Ex parte Coffelt, A-11450

• Decision Date: 21 February 1951
• Docket Number: No. A-11450,A-11450
• Citation: 93 Okla.Crim. 343,228 P.2d 199
• Parties: Ex parte COFFELT.
• Court: United States State Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma. Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma

Page 199

228 P.2d 199

93 Okla.Crim. 343

Ex parte COFFELT.

No. A-11450.

Criminal Court of Appeals of Oklahoma.

Feb. 21, 1951.

Syllabus by the Court.

1. Costs in criminal proceedings are those charges fixed by law which have been necessarily incurred in the prosecution of one charged with a public offense as compensation to the officers for their services.

2. The costs of $1 assessed in criminal cases under the provisions of House Bill No. 492, S.L.1941, page 384, § 361, for the benefit of the Parole Fund and appropriated to pay the salaries and expenses of the Parole Officer and his assistants is not a proper item to be charged in such cases, and is invalid and void since the same does not constitute a charge for a necessary item of expense incident to prosecutions, and its collection is violative of the constitutional division of powers making the courts a coequal branch of government with the legislative and executive departments, and violates the spirit of the Bill of Rights, § 6, Art. 2 of the Oklahoma Constitution, that the courts of justice of the state shall be open to every person, and right and justice shall be administered without sale, denial, delay or prejudice.

Paul W. Updegraff, Norman, for petitioner.

Mac Q. Williamson, Atty. Gen., Lewis A. Wallace, Asst. Atty. Gen., for respondent.

BRETT, Presiding Judge.

This is an original action in hebeas corpus by Charles Eugene Coffelt as petitioner. He alleges in his petition that he is being unlawfully restrained of his liberty in the county jail of Cleveland county, Oklahoma, by the Honorable Jess Jack, Sheriff thereof. He alleges that he was arrested and charged with the offense of unlawfully passing a car in a plainly marked no-passing zone. To the charge as alleged in the complaint, the petitioner plead guilty and was fined $5 and costs in the sum of $9.50. Included in the costs was a charge of $1 to be paid into the state treasury into a fund known as the Parole Fund, said moneys being appropriated to the Pardon and Parole Board to be used for defraying salaries and expenses of the Pardon and Parole Officer and his assistants. The petitioner paid the fine and regular costs, but refused to pay the $1 assessed for the Parole Fund; upon this refusal so to do he was taken into custody. A Rule to Show Cause was immediately thereafter issued herein and the petitioner released on bond.

The sole question involved in this proceeding is the legality and constitutionality of House Bill No. 492, 1949 Session Laws, page 384, 57 O.S.Supp. §§ 361 to 364 inclusive. The pertinent part of said House Bill No. 492 is § 1, which reads as follows, towit: 'From and after the effective date of this Act, each Justice of the Peace, Superior Court, Court of Common Pleas, District Court, and any other Court of record, within the State of Oklahoma, shall, upon the conviction of any person, firm or corporation, for the violation of any State law, whether the same be a misdemeanor or felony, in addition to all other Court costs, assess the additional sum of One Dollar ($1.00) costs against the defendant, which sum shall be collected as all other Court costs are collected and transmitted quarter-annually by the various Court Clerks for all Courts of record, and by the County Treasurers for all Justice of the Peace Courts, to the State Treasurer, who shall deposit the same in a special fund designated as 'The Parole Fund'. The Parole Fund, as the same accrues, is hereby appropriated to the Pardon and Parole Board, without fiscal year limitation, for its use in defraying the salaries and expenses of the Pardon and Parole Officer and his assistants. The State Parole Fund shall be revolving and nonfiscal and payments therefrom shall be made in the same manner as payments are made from other appropriations to the Pardon and Parole Board, or Pardon and Parole Officer.'

Petitioner's first contention is that the charge of the $1 costs against the defendant in a criminal case to the support of the Parole Fund cannot logically be considered as a proper item of costs in such an action. While there is a paucity of authority on this question, we believe the weight thereof and the better reasoned cases sustains the proposition that costs taxed in a criminal proceeding must bear a true relation to the expenses of the prosecution. 20 C.J.S., Costs, § 453, page 694, reads as follows: 'The term costs ordinarily includes only items connected with the actual presentation of testimony and the fees of specified officers, and the courts are reluctant to extend the term beyond its accepted meaning.'

And 20 C.J.S., Costs, § 454, page 694, reads as follows: 'Costs must bear a true relation to the expenses of the prosecution, * * *.'

Also 15 C.J. 330, § 823. In People v. Wallace, 245 Mich. 310, 222 N.W. 698, 699, it was said: 'the costs imposed must bear some reasonable relation to the expenses actually incurred in the prosecution.'

People v. Davis, 247 Mich. 672, 226 N.W. 671; People v. Robinson, 253 Mich. 507, 235 N.W. 236: 'costs are expenses incident to a prosecution, and not inclusive of any of the expenses of holding required terms of the circuit court * * *.'

People v. Hope, 297 Mich. 115, 297 N.W. 206, 208. In City of Carterville v. Cardwell, 152 Mo.App. 32, 132 S.W. 745, 746, the Springfield Court of Appeals observed: 'Costs in criminal proceedings are those charges fixed by law which have been necessarily incurred in the prosecution of one charged with a public offense as compensation to the officers for their services.'

The courts have been so eager to accord persons in criminal cases trials free from unnecessary burdens, in the matter of costs, Bowen v. State, 98 Ala. 83, 12 So. 808, that they have held only costs incurred in accusations establishing guilt, as taxable against a defendant, and not those proven groundless, State v. Ellvin, 51 Kan. 784, 33 P. 547. In re Gilson, 34 Kan. 641, 9 P. 763, it was held where an attempt was made to establish felonious assault and only assault and battery was proven, the costs incident to the attempt to establish felonious assault incurred in subpoenaing witnesses to prove the same, could not be taxed against the defendant. Biester v. State, 65 Neb. 276, 91 N.W. 416, 417, it was said: 'There is, it seems to us, neither reason nor justice in imposing on a person who has committed a misdemeanor the expense incurred by the state in a futile effort to convict him of a felony. The costs of prosecution contemplated by the statute are, in our judgment, the costs incurred in establishing guilt, in proving a specific charge, not those made in connection with a false accusation--a charge that is disproved and shown to be groundless.'

These cases are illustrative of the extent to which the courts extend a protecting arm around criminal trials to protect the guaranty under constitutional government as expressly provided in our Constitution, Art. 2, § 6, 'The courts of justice of the State shall be open to every person, * * * and right and justice shall be administered without sale, denial, delay, or prejudice'. It clearly appears that costs in a criminal action must be for services then rendered in connection with the...