People v. Martin

• Decision Date: 08 April 1947
• Docket Number: January term.,No. 85,85
• Citation: 26 N.W.2d 558,316 Mich. 669
• Parties: PEOPLE v. MARTIN.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

316 Mich. 669

26 N.W.2d 558

PEOPLE

v.MARTIN.

No. 85, January term.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

April 8, 1947.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Kent County; William B. Brown, judge.

Kenneth Martin pleaded guilty to charge of murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment. From orders vacating and setting aside sentence and granting defendant leave to withdraw his plea of guilty, the People of the State of Michigan appeal.

Orders affirmed and case remanded to permit withdrawal of plea of guilty and for arraignment and appropriate proceedings on plea to be entered.

Before the Entire Bench.

Menso R. Bolt, Pros. Atty., and Henry J. Milanowski and George W. Loomis, Asst. Pros. Attys., all of Grand Rapids, for appellant.

Linsey, Shivel, Phelps & Vander Wal, of Grand Rapids, for appellee.

DETHMERS, Justice.

On March 2, 1925 (an information was filed in the circuit court for the county of Kent charging defendant with the crime of murder. The information did not specify the degree of the crime nor the manner, means or method of or circumstances attending its perpetration. Defendant entered a plea of guilty and thereupon an order was entered finding that defendant had pleaded guilty to the crime of murder in the first degree and sentencing him therefor to life imprisonment.

The record discloses no actual determination by the court of the degree of the crime, and it is conceded by plaintiff that no witnesses were sworn and examined in open court for this purpose. 3 Comp.Laws 1915, § 15194, then applicable and identical to present law, Act No. 328, § 318, Pub. Acts 1931, Comp.Laws Supp.1940, § 17115-318, Stat.Ann. § 28.550, provided in part, as to persons indicted for murder, as follows: ‘* * * if such person shall be convicted by confession, the court shall proceed by examination of witnesses to determine the degree of the crime, and shall render judgment accordingly.'

The record of proceedings had on arraignment and at time of sentence is silent on the subject, but plaintiff now has filed the affidavits of the then sheriff and of a police officer who was present at the araignment, who depose and say that before sentence they discussed the facts of the case with the judge and that he then interviewed the defendant. It is plaintiff's position that from these discussions the court learned that this was a killing committed in the perpetration of a robbery, and that from a full knowledge of the facts of the case, thus acquired, the court was enabled to determine the degree of the crime in conformity with the statute. But did the court, as required by the statute, ‘proceed by examination of witnesses to determine the degree of the crime’ and‘render judgment accordingly’?

As defined in 3 Bouv.Law Dict., Rawle's Third Revision, page 3475, a 'witness' is ‘one who testifies under oath to something he knows at first hand.' ‘The term ‘witness,’ in its strict legal sense, means one who gives evidence in a cause before a court; and in its general sense includes all persons from whose lips testimony is extracted to be used in any judicial proceeding, and so includes deponents and affiants as well as persons delivering oral testimony before a court or jury.' 70 C.J. p. 34.

‘A ‘witness' is one who has been sworn according to law and deposes as to his knowledge of the facts in issue upon the trial of a case; and ‘testimony’ means the statement made by the witness under oath in a legal proceeding. Web.Dict.; 1 Bouv.Law Dict. 658.' Poe v. State, 95 Ark. 172,...