Gobles v. Hayes
| Decision Date | 15 July 1942 |
| Docket Number | 14137. |
| Citation | 21 S.E.2d 624,194 Ga. 297 |
| Parties | GOBLES, Warden, v. HAYES et al. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
Syllabus by the Court.
1. Ordinarily a superior court has plenary power over its orders and judgments during the term in which they were rendered and may amend, correct, or revoke them for the purpose of promoting justice.
2. The power of a superior court in a criminal case to amend a sentence during the same term of the court in which it was imposed, by shortening the period of imprisonment, is not lost by entry of the defendant upon the service of such sentence.
3. Where, by an amendment so made during the same term, the period of service in the penitentiary, as fixed in a sentence for a reducible felony, is changed to a shorter term in the public-work camp, as for a misdemeanor, the amendment may also provide for service of the misdemeanor sentence, or any remainder thereof, on probation.
4. The jurisdiction of a trial court as to amendment of sentences is not affected by the Code, § 77-313, relating the the authority of the Prison Commission.
5. Under the preceding rulings, the court was not without jurisdiction, during the same term in which the sentences were imposed, to amend them in the respects above indicated and the judge did not err in sustaining the writ of habeas corpus and in discharging the prisoners in accordance with the sentences as amended.
John T. Ferguson and Preston Rawlins, both of Atlanta, for plaintiff in error.
No appearance for defendants in error.
On July 17, 1941, during the July term, 1941, of the superior court of Early County, Eugene McDonald and Horace Hayes entered pleas of guilty upon an accusation charging them with the offense of cattle-stealing, and were sentenced to a term of two years each in the State penitentiary. Twelve days afterwards, they being confined in jail in the meantime, they began actual service of their sentences in the penitentiary. In December, 1941, during the same July term, which had been kept open by express order, each sentence was so amended as to read as follows: 'Defendant shall serve misdemeanor sentence, to wit: twelve months in the public-work camp, and following that six months in jail, but after serving four and one-half months of said public-work camp sentence, including time in jail prior to, as well as subsequent to, entrance into public-work camp, that he be discharged from his confinement and allowed to serve the remainder of sentences aforesaid outside of the confines of prison, on probation and subject to his good conduct.' It was further ordered as to each defendant that he be forthwith released from custody, and that a copy 'of this amendment be * * * furnished the Penal Board of Georgia, in order that said prisoner be released from his confinement.'
The warden in charge having refused to release the defendants as directed, an application for the writ of habeas corpus was instituted in their behalf. The warden filed a response, alleging that he was holding the defendants under jurisdiction of the State Prison Commission, in virtue of the original sentences imposed in July, 1941. The case was tried on an agreed statement showing the facts above recited. The judge passed an order sustaining the writ, and the warden excepted. (As to substitution of 'public-work camp' for 'chaingang,' see Ga.L.Ex.Sess.1937-38, p. 352.)
The offense of cattle-stealing is a reducible felony, and the defendants could originally have been sentenced as for a misdemeanor. Code, § 27-2501; Ga.L.1939, p. 285, § 2. The sole question presented in this court is whether the court had jurisdiction to amend the sentences after the defendants had begun service thereunder, although the amendments were made during the same term at which the original sentences were imposed, and had the effect of reducing or mitigating the punishment as fixed thereby. There are numerous decisions to the effect that a trial court is without power to change a sentence after the defendant has been committed thereunder, by increasing the punishment, even during the same term in which the original sentence was passed; and while in some jurisdictions it has been held that the punishment can not even be reduced during the same term, after the defendant has entered upon execution of the original sentence, there is a decided conflict in the authorities on the latter question. The question here is not one as to the power of a court to correct its judgment or minutes so as to make them conform to the truth, such as was involved in Merritt v. State, 122 Ga. 752, 50 S.E. 926, Tyler v. State, 125 Ga. 46, 53 S.E. 818, and Pulliam v. Jenkins, 157 Ga. 18, 121 S.E. 679.
The case also differs from Porter v. Garmony, 148 Ga. 261, 96 S.E. 426; Shaw v. Benton, 148 Ga. 589, 97 S.E. 520, holding that a trial judge, after adjournment of the term at which an original sentence was imposed, has no authority to change or modify it; the change here having been made during the term of the original sentences. Nor is Mathews v. Swatts, 16 Ga.App. 208, 84 S.E. 980, in point, when the facts of that case are duly considered. In Rutland v. State, 14 Ga.App. 746, 747, 82 S.E. 293, it was stated that if the defendant has complied with or entered upon the execution of a valid sentence, it cannot be set aside and a new or different one imposed, even at the same term; but in that case the punishment was increased, and was so increased after the original term had passed. Hence, neither did that decision deal with the instant problem.
In Emerson v. Boyles, 170 Ark. 621, 280 S.W. 1005, 44 A.L.R. 1193, it was held by the Supreme Court of Arkansas that where a convict has entered upon the execution of a valid sentence, the court cannot during the term in which such sentence was imposed set it aside and render a new and different one, notwithstanding the punishment is reduced or mitigated, and although the defendant himself accepts the change and claims the benefit of it; but in that case there was a dissenting opinion, concurred in by two Justices, which in the view of this court...
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Hayes v. State
...Koerner (1966), 32 Wis.2d 60, 63, 145 N.W.2d 157; Smith v. State (1967), 33 Wis.2d 695, 702, 148 N.W.2d 39.2 See Gobles v. Hayes (1942), 194 Ga. 297, 298--300, 21 S.E.2d 624; Czaplinski v. Warden of Md. Penitentiary (1950), 196 Md. 654, 657, 75 A.2d 766; Madison v. State (1954), 205 Md. 425......
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