Ex Parte Williford v. Stewart, 40126.

• Citation: 198 S.W.2d 12
• Decision Date: 27 November 1946
• Docket Number: No. 40126.,40126.
• Parties: EX PARTE PRICE WILLIFORD, Petitioner, v. BEN B. STEWART, Acting Warden, Missouri State Penitentiary.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Missouri

198 S.W.2d 12 EX PARTE PRICE WILLIFORD, Petitioner,
v.
BEN B. STEWART, Acting Warden, Missouri State Penitentiary. No. 40126. Supreme Court of Missouri. Court en Banc, November 27, 1946.

Habeas Corpus.

PETITIONER DISCHARGED.

J.E. Taylor, Attorney General, and Gordon Weir, Assistant Attorney General, for respondent.

ELLISON, J.

Habeas Corpus. The petitioner contends his prison time in the penitentiary under convictions in five felony cases has expired, and that his further detention by the respondent warden is illegal, under the following facts.

On February 6, 1933, he pleaded guilty in the circuit court of Jackson County, Division 3, to burglary in the second degree, and larceny, in each of four cases, No's C-14729, C-14730, C-14747 and C-14748. He was jointly prosecuted in each case for those two crimes under Sec. 4448 [all references to our statutes are to R.S. 1939 and Mo. R.S.A.] The punishment assessed by the trial court was imprisonment in the penitentiary for three years on each burglary charge, with a like sentence of three years on each larceny charge. But the court further ordered that the three year sentence for the burglary and the corresponding sentence for the larceny in each case run concurrently. And it further ordered that the sentences in all four cases should likewise run concurrently, thereby fixing the total term of the prisoner's confinement in the penitentiary at three years in all four cases on both charges. Certified

198 S.W.2d 13

copies of these four judgments and the minutes in each case have been brought up as evidence.

On April 8, 1933, a little over two months after receiving the sentences for the burglary and larceny, the petitioner was convicted by a jury in the circuit court of Jackson County, Division 4, of larceny of a motor vehicle in case No. C-14850, and his punishment assessed at fifteen years imprisonment in the penitentiary under Sec. 8404. The certified copy of the judgment and court minutes in that case (which also have been brought up as evidence) are silent as to whether the fifteen year sentence in this motor vehicle theft case should run concurrently or consecutively with the three year aggregate sentence in the four burglary and larceny cases.

But there are attached to both the prisoner's petition and the warden's return in this proceeding two papers verified by one affidavit of the respondent warden as a "full, true and complete copy of Judgment and Sentence of Court in case of Price Williford, #42807" (the petitioner). Petitioner says these papers are the commitments under which he is held. One of them purports to show a single joint judgment in all four burglary and larceny cases together. The other paper purports to be a copy of the fifteen year sentence and judgment in the motor vehicle theft case. It concludes: "Court further orders that the sentence of Fifteen years in the State Penitentiary, to run consecutively, with sentences imposed in causes, C-14729-30-47-48, making a grand total of Eighteen years in the State...