Ex parte Hamilton

• Decision Date: 29 October 1915
• Docket Number: No. 436.,436.
• Parties: Ex parte HAMILTON.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

188 Mich. 499

154 N.W. 567

Ex parte HAMILTON.

No. 436.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

Oct. 29, 1915.

Habeas corpus by George E. Hamilton against Warden Russell, of the State House of Correction, etc. Prisoner remanded.

Argued before BROOKE, C. J., and KUHN, MOORE, STONE, OSTRANDER, BIRD, STEERE, and PERSON, JJ. Edwin H. Lyon, of St. Johns, for petitioner.

Grant Fellows, Atty. Gan., and Samuel D. Pepper, Asst. Atty. Gen., for respondent.

OSTRANDER, J.

Petitioner is imprisoned. He can be held by the warden only by virtue of a lawful commitment. There was a commitment, and it appears to be agreed that it follows the judgment pronounced by the court. The judgment is:

‘That the said George E. Hamilton be confined in the State House of Correction and Branch of the State Prison in the Upper Peninsula, Marquette, Mich., at hard labor, for a period of not less than ten years from and including this day, and the judge thereupon did recommend and state that, in his judgment, the proper maximum penalty would be the term of his natural life as fixed by the statute.’

This was November 25, 1908.

The statute punishment of the crime for committing which petitioner was convicted is life or any number of years. In a consideration of all of the provisions of the statutes, including the indeterminate sentence law, we held in People v. Vitali, 156 Mich. 370, 120 N. W. 1003, that a judgment that the respondent be imprisoned for life was good; the statute punishment in that case, as in this, being life or any term of years, in the discretion of the court. The question presented in Vitali's Case was whether the judgment was bad in view of the provisions of the indeterminate sentence law; it being contended that a life sentence could not be imposed, but only a sentence for a term of years.

We said that the proviso to section 3 of the indeterminate sentence law should be construed as if it read:

‘Provided, that in all cases where the maximum sentence in the discretion of the court may be life or any number of years, the court having in its discretion imposed a sentence for a term of years shall fix both the maximum and minimum sentences.’

We said also, and were obliged to say to support the judgment, that ‘there could be no minimum sentence in case the life sentence were given,’ because the proviso which was in question there and here is that:

‘In all cases where the maximum sentence, in the discretion of the court, may be for life or any number of years, the court imposing sentence shall fix both the minimum and maximum sentences. The minimum term of imprisonment thus fixed by the court shall not exceed one-half of the maximum term so fixed.’

It is obvious that no minimum term of imprisonment can be fixed which shall be one-half of a life term, and that therefore ‘there could be no minimum sentence in case the life sentence were given.’

In People v. Dumas, 161 Mich. 45, 125 N. W. 766, the sentence was for life, and, following People v. Vitali, it was held a good judgment. It is therefore manifest that, if in the case at bar the sentence had been for the life of petitioner, it would have been a good sentence in law, and we are confronted with the question: Was it the judgment of the court, as shown by its record, that petitioner be imprisoned for life? To this question I think but one reasonable answer can be given. We cannot hold the recommendation of the court as the sentence, and ignore the positive language of the judgment fixing a period of imprisonment of not less than ten years. I think it is plain that the court intended to give, and attempted to give, a...