Ponzi v. Fessenden

Decision Date27 March 1922
Docket NumberNo. 631,631
PartiesPONZI v. FESSENDEN et al
CourtU.S. Supreme Court

This case comes here for answer to the following question of law:

'May a prisoner, with the consent of the Attorney General, while serving a sentence imposed by a district court of the United States, be lawfully taken on a writ of habeas corpus, directed to the master of the House of Correction, who, as federal agent under a mittimus issued out of said District Court, has custody of such prisoner, into a state court, in the custody of said master and there put to trial upon indictments there pending against him?'

September 11, 1920, 22 indictments were returned against Charles Ponzi in the superior court for Suffolk county, Mass., charging him with certain larcenies.

October 1, 1920, two indictments charging violation of section 215 of the federal Penal Code (Comp. St. § 10385) were returned against him in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. November 30, 1920, he pleaded guilty to the first count of one of these, and was sentenced to imprisonment for five years in the House of Correction at Plymouth, Mass., and committed.

April 21, 1921, the superior court issued a writ of habeas corpus, directing the master of the House of Correction, who, as federal agent, had custody of Ponzi by virtue of the mittimus issued by the District Court, to bring him before the superior court and to have him there from day to day thereafter for trial upon the pending indictments, but to hold the prisoner at all times in his custody as an agent of the United States, subject to the sentence imposed by the federal District Court. Blake the master of the House of Correction, made a return that he held Ponzi pursuant to process of the United States, and prayed that the writ be dismissed.

Thereafter the Assistant Attorney General of the United States, by direction of the United States Attorney General, stated in open court that the United States had no objection to the issuance of the writ, to the compliance with the writ by Blake, or to the production of Ponzi for trial in the superior court, and that the Attorney General had directed Blake to comply with the writ. Blake then produced the prisoner, who was arraigned on the state indictments and stood mute. A plea of not guilty was entered for him by the court.

May 23, 1921, Ponzi filed in the District Court a petition for a writ of habeas corpus directed against the justice of the superior court, and against Blake, alleging in substance that he was within the exclusive control of the United States, and that the state court had no jurisdiction to try him while thus in federal custody. His petition for writ of habeas corpus was denied. An appeal was taken to the Circuit Court of Appeals, the judges of which certify the question to this court on the foregoing facts. Section 239, Judicial Code (Comp. St. § 1216).

Mr. William H. Lewis, of Boston, Mass., for Ponzi.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 256-259 intentionally omitted] Mr. J. Weston Allen, of Boston, Mass., for Fessenden and others.

Mr. Chief Justice TAFT, after stating the case as above, delivered the opinion of the Court.

We live in the jurisdiction of two sovereignties, each having its own system of courts to declare and enforce its laws in common territory. It would be impossible for such courts to fulfill their respective functions without embarrassing conflict unless rules were adopted by them to avoid it. The people for whose benefit these two systems are maintained are deeply interested that each system shall be effective and unhindered in its vindication of its laws. The situation requires, therefore, not only definite rules fixing the powers of the courts in cases of jurisdiction over the same persons and things in actual litigation, but also a spirit of reciprocal comity and mutual assistance to promote due and orderly procedure.

One accused of crime has a right to a full and fair trial according to the law of the government whose sovereignty he is alleged to have offended, but he has no more than that. He should not be permitted to use the machinery of one sovereignty to obstruct his trial in the courts of the other, unless the necessary operation of such machinery prevents his having a fair trial. He may not complain if one sovereignty waives its strict right to exclusive custody of him for vindication of its laws in order that the other may also subject him to conviction of crime against it. In re Andrews (D. C.) 236 Fed. 300; United States v. Marrin (D. C.) 227 Fed. 314. Such a waiver is a matter that addresses itself solely to the discretion of the sovereignty making it and of its representatives with power to grant it.

One accused of crime, of course, cannot be in two places at the same time. He is entitled to be present at every stage of the trial of himself in each jurisdiction with full opportunity for defense. Frank v. Mangum, 237 U. S. 309, 341, 35 Sup. Ct. 582, 59 L. Ed. 969; Lewis v. United States, 146 U. S. 370, 13 Sup. Ct. 136, 36 L. Ed. 1011. If that is accorded him, he cannot complain. The fact that he may have committed two crimes gives him no immunity from prosecution of either.

The chief rule which preserves our two systems of courts from actual conflict of jurisdiction is that the court which first takes the subject-matter of the litigation into its control, whether this be person or property, must be permitted to exhaust its remedy, to attain which it assumed control, before the other court shall attempt to take it for its purpose. The principle is stated by Mr. Justice Matthews in Covell v. Heyman, 111 U. S. 176, 4 Sup. Ct. 355, 28 L. Ed. 390, as follows:

'The forbearance which courts of co-ordinate jurisdiction, administered under a single system, exercise towards each other, whereby conflicts are avoided, by avoiding interference with the process of each other, is a principle of comity, with perhaps no higher sanction than the utility which comes from concord; but between state courts and those of the United States it is something more. It is a principle of right and of law, and therefore, of necessity. It leaves nothing to discretion or mere convenience. These courts do not belong to the same system, so far as their jurisdiction is concurrent; and although they coexist in the same space, they are independent, and have no common superior. They exercise jurisdiction, it is true, within the same territory, but not in the same plane; and when one takes into its jurisdiction a specific thing, that res is as much withdrawn from the judicial power of the other, as if it had been carried physically into a different territorial sovereignty.'

The Heyman Case concerned property, but the same principle applies to jurisdiction over persons as is shown by the great judgment of Chief Justice Taney in Ableman v. Booth, 21 How. 506, 16 L. Ed. 169. quoted from, and relied upon, in Covell v. Heyman.

In the case at bar, the federal District Court first took custody of Ponzi. He pleaded guilty, was sentenced to imprisonment and was detained under United States authority to suffer the punishment imposed. Until the end of his term and his discharge, no state court could assume control of his body without the consent of the United States. Under statutes permitting it, he might have been taken under the writ of habeas corpus to give evidence in a federal court, or to be tried there if in the same district, section 753, Rev. Stat. (section 1281, Comp. St.), or be removed by order of a federal court to be tried in another district, section 1014, Rev. Stat. (section 1674, Comp. St.), without violating the order of commitment made by the sentencing court. Ex parte Bollman, 4 Cranch, 75, 98, 2 L. Ed. 554; Ex parte Lamar (C. C. A.) 274 Fed. 160, 164. This is with the authority of the same sovereign which committed him.

There is no express authority authorizing the transfer of a federal prisoner to a state court for such purposes. Yet we have no doubt that it exists and is to be exercised with the consent of the Attorney General. In that officer, the power and discretion to practice the comity in such matters between the federal and state courts is vested. The Attorney General is the head of the Department of Justice. Rev. Stat. § 346 (Comp. St. § 515). He is the hand of the president in taking care that the laws of the United States in protection of the interests of the United States in legal proceedings and in the prosecution of offenses be faithfully executed. United States v. San Jacinto Tin Co., 125 U. S. 273, 8 Sup. Ct. 850, 31 L. Ed. 747; In re Neagle, 135 U. S. 1, 10 Sup. Ct. 658, 34 L. Ed. 55; Kern River Co. v. United State, 257 U. S. 147, 42 Sup. Ct. 60, 66 L. Ed. 175, decided November 21, 1921; Rev. Stat. § 359, Act of June 30, 1906, 34 Stat. 816; Rev. Stat. §§ 360, 361, 357, 364 (Comp. St. §§ 533-536, 531, 539). By section 367, Rev. Stat. (section 542) the Attorney General is authorized to send the Solicitor General or any officer of the Department of Justice 'to any state or district in the United States to attend to the interests of the United States in any suit pending in any of the courts of the United States, or in the courts of any state, or to attend to any other interest of the United States.'

The prisons of the United States and the custody of prisoners under sentence are generally under the supervision and regulation of the Attorney General. Act March 3, 1891, 26 Stat. 839 (Comp. St. §§ 10552-10560). He is to approve the expenses of the transportation of United States prisoners by the marshals under his supervision to the wardens of the prisons where they are to be confined, 26 Stat. 839. He makes contracts with managers of state prisons for the custody of United States prisoners. Rev. Stat. § 5548 (Comp. St. § 10549)...

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