People v. Coughlin

• Decision Date: 03 November 1887
• Parties: PEOPLE v. COUGHLIN.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

67 Mich. 466
35 N.W. 72

PEOPLE
v.
COUGHLIN.

Supreme Court of Michigan

November 3, 1887.

Error to circuit court, Chippewa county; J.H. STEERE, Judge.

[35 N.W. 73]

Brennan & Donnelly, (Lawrence F. Bedford, of counsel,) for defendant, appellant.

Moses Taggart, Atty. Gen., and John H. Goff, Pros. Atty., for the People.

MORSE, J.

The respondent was convicted of the crime of manslaughter in the circuit court for the county of Chippewa, for shooting and killing one Joseph Perault.

It is complained, first, as a reason for the reversal of this conviction, that a legal jury was not summoned at the term of court in which his trial took place. A motion was entered challenging the array for the following reasons: “First. Said panel was not drawn fourteen days before the first day of the term. Second. Because more than the lawful number was summoned, thirty-five being drawn instead of twenty-four. Third. Because there are eight townships and supervisor districts in the county of Chippewa, and it appears from the certificate of the officers drawing said jury that no jurors

[35 N.W. 74]

were summoned or drawn from two of said townships, one of which, ‘Sugar Island,’ was the scene of the killing, and such certificate does not state whether the jurors drawn from Sault Ste. Marie were summoned from the village or township of that name. Fourth. Because the order directing the drawing and summoning of said jury is irregular and insufficient.” The prosecuting attorney stood on said challenge as of a demurrer. The court sustained the demurrer, and overruled said challenge. In the argument in this court the first objection is abandoned, but the others are insisted upon. We think the challenge was properly overruled.

The second and fourth objections may be considered together. At the opening of the term the circuit judge made the following order: “No petit jurors having been drawn and summoned for this term of court, and it satisfactorily appearing to the court now here that the attendance of said jurors is necessary, it is therefore hereby ordered and directed that thirty-five qualified jurors be forthwith drawn and summoned in pursuance of the statute in such cases made and provided, to be and appear in said court at the court-house, in the village of Sault Ste. Marie, in said county, without delay, to serve as such petit jurors.” It is claimed, upon the authority of People v. Hall, 48 Mich. 482, 12 N.W.Rep. 665, that this order should have specified the townships from which the jurors were to be drawn, and that the vicinage of the alleged offense should have been included in such order. Under section 7578, How.St., the court could order the jury drawn from the county at large, or from specified townships near the county-seat. In this case the order was that the jurors be drawn and...