State ex rel. Kelly v. Wolfer
| Decision Date | 15 November 1912 |
| Docket Number | 17,991 - (268) |
| Citation | 138 N.W. 315,119 Minn. 368 |
| Parties | STATE ex rel. JOHN F. KELLY v. HENRY WOLFER |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Upon the petition of John F. Kelly, the district court for Washington county issued its writ of habeas corpus directing Henry Wolfer, as warden of the Minnesota state prison, to have the body of Paul C. Kelly before the court. The substance of the petition for the writ is stated in the opinion. After hearing, the court, Stolberg, J., made findings and as conclusion of law quashed the writ and remanded Paul C. Kelly to the custody of respondent. From the order quashing the writ and remanding the prisoner petitioner appealed. Affirmed.
Habeas corpus -- trial of appeal.
Since an appeal in habeas corpus proceedings is, by R.L. 1905 § 4602, required to be tried in this court in the same manner "as if the writ had originally issued out of" this court, errors and irregularities occurring on the trial below need not be considered.
Judgment -- attack by habeas corpus.
Where a court has jurisdiction of the person and the subject-matter, and could render a judgment upon a showing of any sufficient state of facts, any judgment which it may render, however erroneous, irregular, or unsupported by evidence, will be sustained as against an attack by habeas corpus.
Judgment -- sentence to reformatory -- attack by habeas corpus.
Under R.L. 1905, § 5454, authorizing the court to sentence to the reformatory any person not less than sixteen nor more than thirty years of age, etc., and who has been convicted of a crime punishable by imprisonment in the state prison, the fact that a judgment of conviction of such a crime, upon which the defendant is sentenced to the reformatory, fails to state the age of the defendant, does not render it subject to attack on habeas corpus.
Act valid.
R.L. 1905, § 5455, amended by Laws 1911, c. 61, authorizing the board of control to transfer prisoners from the reformatory to the state prison, and vice versa, is not unconstitutional, as constituting a legislative attempt to vest administrative officers with judicial functions.
John F. Kelly, pro se.
Lyndon A. Smith, Attorney General, and C. Louis Weeks, Assistant Attorney General, for respondent.
On June 23, 1910, one Kelly was convicted, in the district court of Hennepin county, of the crime of forgery in the second degree, and was then and there sentenced to imprisonment in the state reformatory until he should "thence be discharged by due course of law or by competent authority." On February 23, 1912, by order of the state board of control, made pursuant to the authority vested in them by R.L. 1905, § 5455, the said Kelly was transferred to the state prison. On July 22, 1912, a writ of habeas corpus in his behalf was sued out of the district court of Washington county -- the petition therefor alleging that his imprisonment was illegal and without authority of law, in that (1) there was an agreement between the prisoner and the trial judge, prior to the former's conviction, which was upon a plea of guilty, that his imprisonment under such conviction should not exceed eighteen months, and that the plea of guilty was entered in reliance upon such agreement, and in order that the prisoner might be cured of a drug habit; (2) that the judgment of conviction did not state on its face that the prisoner was "not less than sixteen nor more than thirty years of age," and thus failed to show the age limit of sentence to the reformatory, while in fact the prisoner was over thirty years of age at the time of his sentence; (3) that the law authorizing the prisoner's transfer to the state prison was and is unconstitutional and void, and that, as there is no law for his return to the reformatory, he should be discharged. The court below quashed the writ, and remanded the prisoner to the custody of the respondent; and this is an appeal from its order in such regard.
1. The appellant complains here of certain rulings below; but it is not necessary either to state or decide the questions thus sought to be raised, for under R.L. 1905, § 4602, an appeal in habeas corpus proceedings is tried in this court in the same manner, to quote the statute, "as if the writ had originally issued out of" this court. See 1 Dunnell, Minn. Dig. § 4142; State v. Riley, 116 Minn. 1, 133 N.W. 86. In view, however, of the fact that the case was submitted to this court upon the record made in the proceedings below, and precisely as if the trial here were upon an ordinary appeal, we will consider the point most earnestly urged by the relator in this connection, namely, that the bill of exceptions states that the original "writ, warrant, or other written authority" under which the prisoner was detained was not produced and exhibited to the trial court, to the extent of saying that the record does not bear him out in this contention.
2. Coming, then, to the first and second grounds of discharge alleged in the petition, as above stated, we find that neither of them can be sustained. When one is confined under the final judgment of a court, he can be released on habeas corpus only for jurisdictional defects. Such writ cannot be allowed to perform the function of a writ of error or appeal. If the court has jurisdiction of the person and the subject-matter, and could render a judgment upon a showing of any sufficient state of facts, any judgment which it may render, however erroneous, irregular, or unsupported by evidence, will be sustained as against an attack by habeas corpus. 1 Dunnell, Minn. Dig. § 4129; State v. Riley, supra. Tested by these rules, the grounds stated in the first and second subdivisions of the petition for the writ in the instant case cannot be sustained.
Furthermore, in regard to the second of these contentions, the records show that the prisoner was examined by the court on oath concerning his age before imposing sentence, and that he stated it to be twenty-nine years. The relator contends that this cannot be considered, or is at least open to contradiction by evidence introduced by him below to the effect that there was no such testimony; the basis of such contention being that the minutes of the court which showed such testimony were not signed by the judge. All that is necessary, however, to prove the minutes of a court, is a copy thereof, attested by the clerk and under the seal of the court, and this is what we find the record in the instant case.
And again, with regard to this second ground for a discharge alleged by the relator, we think that the customary presumption in favor of the regularity of a judgment must here prevail. See Ex parte Marlow, 75 N.J.L. 400, 68 A. 171; Ex parte Wilson, 114 U.S. 417, 5 S.Ct. 935, 29 L.Ed. 89. See, also, In Matter of Gregory, 219 U.S. 218, 31 S.Ct. 143, 55 L.Ed. 184. We have no statute in this state requiring that the judgment shall contain anything whatever concerning the age of the prisoner, and in the absence of such a statute we do not think any recital in this regard is necessary in order to validate a sentence to the reformatory. One might as well argue that, because our statutes forbid the sentence of a minor under a certain age to the state prison, every judgment of conviction for a crime punishable by confinement in such prison must show that the prisoner is over that age. There is nothing that militates against our conclusion in this regard in the cases cited and relied upon by the relator, namely, State v. Whittier, 108 Minn. 447, 122 N.W. 319; State v. Billings, 55 Minn. 467, 57 N.W. 206, 794, 43 Am. St. 525; State v. Kinmore, 54 Minn. 135, 55 N.W. 830, 40 Am. St. 305, and some others. None of these cases are in point, for all of them bear upon the question of jurisdiction of the proceedings. Here there was unquestionably jurisdiction of the person and the subject-matter, and if the sentence of the prisoner to the reformatory was improper it involved a mere error or irregularity, which is not ground for discharge on habeas corpus. Ryan v. Rhodes, 167 Ind. 121, 76 N.E. 249, 78 N.E. 330; People v. Superintendent, 46 Misc. 131, 93 N.Y.S. 218.
3. The relator's last contention is that the statute, R.L. 1905 § 5455, authorizing the board of control to transfer prisoners from the reformatory to the state prison, is invalid under Const. Art. 3, § 1, as being a legislative attempt to authorize purely ministerial officers to exercise judicial functions. The generic question raised by this contention is not a novel one. It is long since that criminology gave us our modern conception of criminality, from which has arisen an ever-increasing tendency to regard "punishment" for crime as being not so much compensatory as reformatory, and from this tendency, in turn, have sprung laws greatly amplifying and extending the administrative functions incident to the execution of the penalties prescribed by law for crime and imposed by the courts upon those who have incurred the same. It is not at all strange then that, in the course of legislative attempts in the various states of the Union to meet the requirements of this extended administrative system, laws should sometimes be passed which at least seem to attempt to vest administrative officers with powers properly appertaining to the judicial or executive departments of the government. Bitter attacks have been made upon some of these laws, most notably upon the socalled indeterminate sentence system, with its credits for good behavior, upon the parole system, and upon the prison transfer system; such attacks being grounded variously upon the contentions that the legislation assailed attempts to vest administrative officers with the judicial power of sentence or the executive power of pardon, or...
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