Grimes v. Greer
| Decision Date | 21 September 1967 |
| Docket Number | No. 24311,24311 |
| Citation | 223 Ga. 628,157 S.E.2d 260 |
| Parties | Ralph GRIMES, Sheriff v. Edward Thomas GREER. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
Arthur K. Bolton, Atty. Gen., Marion O. Gordon, Asst. Atty. Gen., Joel C. Williams, Jr., Atlanta, for appellant.
Edward B. Everett, Atlanta, for appellee.
Syllabus Opinion by the Court
Edward Thomas Greer brought a petition for habeas corpus against Ralph Grimes, Sheriff of Fulton County, for his release from custody claiming that his sentence had been served. The evidence shows that the petitioner had been sentenced by the Superior Court of Muscogee County on August 2, 1965, to one year in prison for possessing an automobile with an altered serial number. The petitioner appealed his conviction to the Court of Appeals of Georgia and was released on an appeal bond. On September 13, 1965 he was apprehended and subsequently convicted in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Georgia on federal charges of conspiracy to violate the National Motor Vehicle Theft Act and was sentenced to three years and two months in prison. This sentence was affirmed on appeal and began to run on April 15, 1966, when he was arrested by the federal authorities and lodged in the Muscogee County jail as a federal prisoner. He remained so incarcerated until May 12, 1966, when he was placed in the federal penitentiary. The Court of Appeals of Georgia affirmed his conviction on the State offense and the remittitur was filed in the Superior Court of Muscogee County on May 9, 1966. The petitioner was paroled by the federal authorities and delivered to the respondent sheriff on June 5, 1967. On the habeas corpus hearing, the trial court ordered the petitioner released from such custody and the respondent appeals this judgment. Held:
The petitioner contends that he was entitled to be released on the habeas corpus hearing under Code Ann. § 27-2510 (Cobb, 836, Ga.L.1956, pp. 161, 168, Ga.L.1964, p. 494) which provides in part that: '(b) Where a person is convicted on more than one indictment or accusation at separate terms of court, or in different courts, and sentenced to imprisonment, such sentences shall be served concurrently, the one with the other, unless otherwise expressly provided therein.'
'Except as the rule is changed by statute to the contrary, two or more sentences imposed by courts of different sovereignties, such as two states, or a state and the United States, and silent as to their cumulative or concurrent character, will ordinarily be construed as consecutive and not concurrent * * *' 24B C.J.S. Criminal Law § 1996(6), p. 677.
The power to prescribe penalties to be imposed for the commission of crime rests with the legislature and is part of the sovereign power of a State to maintain social order. 21 Am.Jur.2d 542, § 577. Generally, penal laws have no extraterritorial...
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Herman v. Brewer, 54893
...* * *' Some of the many cases accepting this principle are: Chaney v. Ciccone, 8 Cir. (1970), 427 F.2d 363, 365; Grimes v. Greer, 223 Ga. 628, 157 S.E.2d 260, 261 (1967); Commonwealth ex rel. Jones v. Rundle, 413 Pa. 456, 199 A.2d 135, 138 (1964); Commonwealth ex rel. Pitts v. Myers, 196 Pa......
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Everett v. Cobb Cnty.
...co-extensive with its legislative power.") (quoting United States v. Bevans, 16 U.S. 336, 387 (1818) (Marshall, C.J.)); Grimes v. Greer, 223 Ga. 628 (1967) ("Generally, penal laws have no extraterritorial effect.")). 74. Strassheim v. Daily, 221 U.S. 280, 285 (1911) (citing Simpson v. State......
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Cottingham v. State
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Howell v. State
...held that the power to define crimes and the punishment therefor was vested by the constitution in the legislature. In Grimes v. Greer, 223 Ga. 628, 157 S.E.2d 260 (1967), the Supreme Court of Georgia held that the power to prescribe penalties to be imposed for the commission of crime rests......