People v. Mahler, 71

• Decision Date: 05 December 1950
• Docket Number: No. 71,71
• Citation: 329 Mich. 155,45 N.W.2d 14
• Parties: PEOPLE v. MAHLER.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

Page 14

45 N.W.2d 14

329 Mich. 155

PEOPLE v. MAHLER.

No. 71.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

Dec. 5, 1950.

Writ of Certiorari Denied March 12, 1951.

James T. Sloan, Centerville, for appellant.

Harold F. Bristol, Pros. Atty., Coldwater, Jack R. Sutherland, Asst. Pros. Atty., Coldwater, for the people.

Before the Entire Bench.

DETHMERS, Justice.

Defendant was convicted in 1935, upon a plea of guilty, of the crime of murder in the first degree. This is an appeal from the trial court's order of March 2, 1948, denying defendant's motion for new trial.

Defendant complains that he was brought into Michigan from the State of Indiana and subjected to the jurisdiction of the courts of this state by means of abduction by Michigan officers. Apparently his objection in this connection is intended to be directed to the jurisdiction of the court. It is without merit. In re Little, 129 Mich. 454, 89 N.W. 38, 57 L.R.A. 295; In re Johnson, 167 U.S. 120, 17 S.Ct. 735, 42 L.Ed. 103; Lascelles v. Georgia, 148 U.S. 537, 13 S.Ct. 687, 37 L.Ed. 549; Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S. 436, 7 S.Ct. 225, 30 L.Ed. 421. Furthermore, the record amply supports the trial court's finding that defendant came into this state voluntarily.

Defendant charges as error the court's imposition of sentence upon defendant's plea of guilty without taking testimony to establish a corpus delicti, citing cases which hold a defendant's confession or admission of guilt inadmissible in evidence until the corpus delicti has been established. These cases, in point when a trial is had on the merits, have no application to the acceptance of a plea of guilty nor to the statutory proceedings thereafter for determination of the degree of the murder. Not only is defendant's contention invalid in point of law, but, as it happens, the testimony taken in the mentioned statutory proceedings in this case would have been sufficient to establish the corpus delicti.

Defendant contends that he was denied a fair trial and due process, in support of which he says that he was made the victim of 'speedy justice'; that he was not represented by counsel; that from the time of his arrest at 5:30 p. m. until his sentence at 8:30 p. m. of that same evening and his imprisonment in state prison the next morning he was never informed of his right to a trial by jury and to the assistance of counsel, at public expense if necessary, nor of the consequences of a plea of guilty; that he was held incommunicado, denied the right to call or contact friends, relatives or other help, offered leniency if he would plead guilty, threatened with a severe sentence if he should stand trial and, finally, beaten by the prosecuting attorney and sheriff until he agreed to plead guilty and signed a confession. It is to be observed that at the first hearing upon his motion for new trial in March of 1948, defendant testified at length but said nothing about promises, threats, physical abuse or other means of coercion having been employed to compel a confession and plea of guilty; all that seems to have been an after-thought to which he testified at the second hearing in June of 1949. These claims of force, threats, promises, and refusal of his request to contact outside help and the other claims of defendant above outlined, were all specifically denied under oath...