In re Mead

• Citation: 220 Mich. 480,190 N.W. 235
• Decision Date: 02 November 1922
• Docket Number: No. 73,June Term.,73
• Parties: In re MEAD.
• Court: Supreme Court of Michigan

220 Mich. 480

190 N.W. 235

In re MEAD.

No. 73, June Term.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

Nov. 2, 1922.

Certiorari to Recorder's Court of Detroit; Charles L. Bartlett, Recorder, and Edward J. Jeffries, Judge.

Jesse Mead was adjudged guilty of contempt of the Recorder's Court of Detroit, and he brings certiorari. Reversed and vacated.

Argued before FELLOWS, C. J., and WIEST, McDONALD, BIRD, and SHARPE, JJ.James R. Walsh, of Detroit (Clarence E. Wilcox, of Detroit, of counsel), for appellant.

Stewart Hanley, of Detroit, amicus curiae.

WIEST, J.

Certiorari to review proceedings in which Jesse Mead, a police officer, was adjudged guilty of contempt of recorder's court of Detroit. Certain persons were taken into custody about 8 o'clock p. m. February 8, 1922, by the police department of that city. They were held at a station of which Mead was in charge at the time in question. No formal charge or complaint had been made against them, or any of them. The minutes at the station showed that each of them was held for the reasons: ‘Disorderly person, gaming, investigation.’ About 11 o'clock that evening, on behalf of such persons, Judge Jeffries, of the recorder's court, received a ‘suspicion bond,’ so called, as follows:

‘Recorder's Court Suspicion Bond.

‘State of Michigan, County of Warne, City of Detroit-ss.:

‘Recorder's Court of the City of Detroit.

‘Be it remembered, that on the 8th day of February A. D. 1922, Max Irving, Jack Neville, Clayton Dusenbury, Clark Babbitt, Walter Jones, John Gromp, Charles Phillips, Walter Baker, of the city of Detroit, in said county, as principal, and Gussie Snook, of the same place, as surety, personally came before the undersigned, one of the judges of the recorder's court of the said city of Detroit, in said county of Wayne, and severally and respectively acknowledged themselves indebted to the people of the state of Michigan, in the sum of five hundred dollars, each to be levied of their respective goods and chattels, lands and tenements, if default should be made in the condition following:

‘Whereas, The said Max Irving, Jack Neville, Clayton Dusenbury, Clark Babbitt, Walter Jones, John Gromp, Charles Phillips, Walter Baker, were arrested and are in custody at Central and Bethune police stations on suspicion of disorderly persons-gaming, to which charge the said above-named defendants are ready to plead not guilty, and said above-named defendants were ordered to each recognize themselves in the sum of five hundred dollars, with one surety in the like sum, for their appearance at the said recorder's court for arraignment on said charge:

‘Now, therefore, the condition of this recognizance is such that, if the said above-named defendants each shall personally appear at the recorder's court room, in the city and county aforesaid, on the 9th day of February, A. D. 1922, at 9:00 o'clock in the forenoon of said day, for arraignment on said charge, and shall appear in said court from day to day, as ordered by said court, and shall not depart the said court without leave, then this recognizance to be void, or else to remain in full force.

‘If charge is other than herein above specified, bond is not to be honored.

‘[Signed] Gussie Snook. [L. S.]

‘Taken, subscribed, and acknowledged the day and year first above written before me. [Signed] Edward J. Jeffries, One of the Judges of the Recorder's Court of the City of Detroit.’

(Justification by surety.)

The judge then issued the following order:

‘State of Michigan.

‘In the Recorder's Court for the City of Detroit.

‘Order.

‘In the Matter of the Arrest and Detention of Clark Babbitt, Clayton Dusenbury, Max Irving, Jack Neville, by Whatever Name They may be Held.

‘At a session of the recorder's court, held in chambers, in the city of Detroit, on the 8th day of February, A. D. 1922. Present: The Hon. Edward J. Jeffries, Judge of the Recorder's Court.

‘Application having been made for the release of the above-named prisoners, and a proper bond having been executed, with sufficient surety justifying, and the condition of the said bond or recognizance being for the appearance of the said persons at the recorder's court for the city of Detroit, on Thursday, the ninth day of Feb., A. D. 1922, at 9:00 o'clock in the forenoon of that...