State v. Creechley
Decision Date | 22 January 1904 |
Docket Number | 1502 |
Citation | 75 P. 384,27 Utah 142 |
Court | Utah Supreme Court |
Parties | THE STATE OF UTAH, Respondent, v. MOSES CREECHLEY, Appellant |
Appeal from the Second District Court, Morgan County.--Hon. T Marioneaux, Judge.
REVERSED.
The defendant was convicted of perjury and appealed.
L. R Rogers, Esq., and John A. Street, Esq., for appellant. S Francis, of Counsel.
Hon. M. A. Breeden, Attorney-General, and Hon. W. R. White, Deputy Attorney-General, for the State.
--The defendant was charged by information with having committed the crime of perjury. He entered the pleas of "Not guilty" and "Former acquittal." At the trial the jury returned a verdict of "Guilty as charged in the information," but made no finding upon the plea of autrefois acquit, and was discharged. The court afterwards entered judgment of conviction, overruled a motion for a new trial, and passed sentence of imprisonment in the penitentiary. Thereupon the defendant appealed.
It is contended for the prisoner that, the jury having failed to make a finding upon the plea of former acquittal, the court erred in pronouncing judgment upon the verdict of guilty. This contention appears to be sound. Our statute in relation to verdicts (section 4891, Rev. St. 1898), so far as material here, provides:
Under these provisions, whenever a defendant in a criminal action enters the plea of autrefois acquit it becomes the plain duty of the court to require the jury, before discharging it, to find upon the issue thus raised. This is so notwithstanding the fact, as insisted by the respondent, that the burden of proving his former acquittal of the same offense is upon the accused. Whether or not there was proof showing a former acquittal of the identical offense, the plea raised a question of fact for the determination of the jury, as much so as the plea of not guilty. This court held likewise in People v. Kerm, 8 Utah 268, 271, 30 P. 988, where it was said: "It was the duty of the court at the former trial to require the jury to find on the issue raised by the plea of former acquittal, and the jury should not have been discharged until they had by their verdict found as to both the issues presented, and if judgment had been entered on the verdict without such finding, it would have been, on appeal, ground for a new trial." So, in this case, the court having discharged the jury without a finding upon that plea, it was ground for a new trial, and the motion therefor ought to have been granted.
The Attorney-General, however, appears to insist, on behalf of the State, that since the evidence introduced at the trial of the cause is not before us, we must presume, the burden of proof being upon the defendant to establish his plea, that there was no evidence introduced in support of the plea of autrefois acquit, and that therefore we cannot interfere with the judgment. This, under the circumstances of this case, where it appears a trial was regularly had upon both pleas, and that no disposition was made of the one, either by the court or jury, would be carrying the doctrine of presumptions to a greater length than justice would warrant. As well might we indulge a presumption that there was no evidence offered as to the plea of not guilty. Both pleas raised questions of fact to be determined by the court and jury.
In People v. Fuqua, 61 Cal. 377, a case similar to the one at bar, the Supreme Court of California said:
So, in Solliday v. Com., 28 Pa. 13, Mr. Justice Black, speaking for the court as to a plea of autrefois convict, said: 22 Ency. Pl. & Pr., 875; People v. Kinsey, 51 Cal. 278; People v. Helbing, 59 Cal. 567; People v. Hamberg, 84 Cal. 468, 24 P. 298; Com. v. Demuth, 12 Serg. & R. 389; Burks v. State (Tex. App.), 6 S.W. 300; Moody v. State, 60 Ala. 78; Wright v. State, 27 Tex. Ct. App. 447, 11 S.W. 458; Dominick v. State, 91 Am. Dec. 496.
The judgment must be reversed, and the cause remanded with directions to the court below to grant a new trial. It is so ordered.
DISSENT BY: McCARTY
--
I am unable to concur with my Brethren in the foregoing opinion. The appeal in this case is taken solely on the judgment roll. There being no bill of exceptions, the evidence is not before us.
The information, in part, charges that A part of the testimony set out in the information is, in substance: "That some time in the month of August or September, A. D. 1901, he, the said Moses Creechley, was requested by one Bird to take a certain steer belonging to Bird to one Crouch, a butcher doing business at Morgan City, Utah, which defendant promised to do, or to get one Carpenter to take the steer to Crouch; that Carpenter took the steer to Crouch; that on the sixteenth day of September, A. D. 1901, at the request of Bird, the said Moses Creechley, together with one Alma Bertosch, drove the said steer from the corral or slaughterhouse of said Crouch right along the road west from the said Morgan City to the creamery (meaning thereby a certain building called the creamery, about a mile west of said Morgan City),' and after they, said Creechley and Bertosch, left the creamery (meaning thereby while they were then and there driving said steer), they turned south and west towards Porterville, and stayed there all night." Then follows a long list of specifications of other parts of the testimony wherein it is alleged the defendant committed perjury.
To the information the defendant entered a plea of not guilty, and the record contains the following plea of autrefois acquit: "The defendant also pleads that he has already been acquitted of the offense charged by the judgment of the district court of the Second Judicial District, rendered at Morgan City, Morgan county, Utah, on the second day of July, 1902."
The record shows that the case mentioned in the information wherein it is alleged defendant committed perjury is one in which he was acquitted of the crime of grand larceny, and the judgment rendered in that case is the judgment referred to and pleaded in bar by the defendant in this action.
The record also contains the following stipulation,...
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