In re Lambrecht

• Decision Date: 27 July 1904
• Citation: 100 N.W. 606,137 Mich. 450
• Parties: In re LAMBRECHT.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

137 Mich. 450
100 N.W. 606

In re LAMBRECHT.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

July 27, 1904.

Petition by William J. Lambrecht for writ of habeas corpus. Denied.

Petitioner was convicted October 26, 1903, of an attempt to utter a forged instrument on July 10, 1903, and sentenced to the State Prison for not less than 2 1/2 and not more than 3 years, under Act No. 136, p. 168, of the Public Acts of 1903, known as the ‘Indeterminate Sentence Law.’ The act took effect September 18, 1903. The punishment for uttering a forged instrument is imprisonment in the State Prison not more than 14 years, or in the county jail not more than 1 year. Comp. Laws, § 11,660. No express provision is made by statute for the punishment of attempts to utter forged instruments. The statute in regard to attempts reads thus: ‘If the offense so attempted to be committed is punishable by imprisonment in the State Prison for life, or for five years or more, the person convicted of such an attempt, shall be punished by imprisonment in the State Prison not more than three years, or in the county jail not more than one year.’ Comp. Laws, § 11,784. When the crime in this case was committed, the punishment was that provided by section 11,784. The petitioner is now before us on the writ of habeas corpus, and the validity of his sentence is attacked upon the following grounds: (1) The sentence is void because made by virtue of a statute not in force at the time the crime was committed. (2) The act is unconstitutional and void in so far as it provides for the sentence of persons convicted of crimes committed before it took effect. (3) That it repealed those portions of previous statutes providing a different punishment than provided by its provisions, and petitioner could not be sentenced under the provisions of the act in force at the time the crime was committed. (4) That if the effect of the act was not to so repeal said statute, it operated as an amendment or exclusive provision for the sentence and punishment of all persons convicted of crime after it took effect, and therefore there was no law in force at the time the petitioner was convicted and sentenced authorizing any punishment whatever, except confinement in the county jail. (5) The said sentence being void, and having been in part carried into effect, this court has no jurisdiction to remand petitioner for sentence, if a lawful one might have been inflicted under the original statute applicable to his offense.

The provisions of Act No. 136 material here are:

‘Section 1. Every sentence to the State Prison at Jackson, to the Michigan Reformatory at Ionia, to the State House of Correction and Branch of the State Prison in the Upper Peninsula, and to the Detroit House of Correction, of any person hereafter convicted of a crime, except of a person sentenced for life, or a child under fifteen years of age, shall be an indeterminate sentence as hereinafter provided. The term of imprisonment of any person so convicted and sentenced shall not exceed the maximum term provided by law for the crime for which the prisoner was convicted and sentenced, and no prisoner shall be discharged until after he shall have served at least the minimum term as provided by law for the crime for which he was convicted: provided, that in all cases where the...