State v. Gruff
| Decision Date | 26 September 1902 |
| Parties | STATE v. GRUFF. |
| Court | New Jersey Supreme Court |
(Syllabus by the Court.)
Error to court of oyer and terminer, Camden county.
Lafayette Gruff was convicted of murder, and brings error. Affirmed.
John Meirs and T. P. Curley, for plaintiff in error.
Frank T. Lloyd, Prosecutor of Pleas, for the State.
At the last term of the Camden oyer the defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree, and now seeks by writ of error to reverse the judgment.
His first ground of complaint is that the indictment against him was found by a grand jury organized in the court of quarter sessions, and was presented to that court although that court had not power to try an indictment for such a crime. The course pursued in the courts below is expressly sanctioned by the criminal procedure act (P. L. 1898, p. 866), the first section of which enacts that the court of quarter sessions shall have cognizance of all crimes of an indictable nature perpetrated in the county, and the fifth and sixth sections of which authorize the court to organize the grand jury, and receive indictments presented by that body, when no justice of the supreme court is present, in the same manner as the court of oyer and terminer might do. The only limitation upon the power of the sessions in such matters is contained in the proviso of the first section that the sessions may not try indictments for treason or for murder, but must deliver such indictments, when presented before it, to the supreme court or court of oyer and terminer for trial. The substance of this legislation has existed for many years. In view of the authority expressly conferred upon the legislature by the constitution to ordain and establish courts other than those named in that instrument, we entertain no doubt as to the validity of these laws. The next ground of complaint relates to the admission as evidence of a confession made by the defendant. The crime with which the defendant stood charged was the killing of his wife at Westmont,—an act which was at first thought to have been committed by shooting. On the day when the homicide took place the defendant was arrested by Jacob Schiller, and he talked to him on the way to the office of the public prosecutor. On arriving at that office, Schiller, in presence of the defendant, said to the assistant prosecutor: "This man would like to make a statement about the shooting affair at Westmont." Thereupon that official said to the defendant: "Are you the man that has been making all this trouble?" The defendant answered: "I am." Then the assistant prosecutor said to him: To this the defendant replied that he wanted to make a statement, and forthwith proceeded with the "confession" that was offered in evidence. The facts above mentioned having been sworn to by witnesses in presence of the jury, the defendant's counsel still objected to the admission of the confession, on the ground that the defendant was not shown to have been aware of the charge against him. In answer to this objection, the state alleged that the confession itself would fully evince the defendant's knowledge on that point; and the trial justice, assuming that such knowledge ought to be shown, ruled that he would hear the confession in...
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State v. Broxton
...in this State that the trial judge may, in his discretion, try that issue in or outside the presence of the jury. State v. Gruff, 68 N.J.L. 287, 290, 53 A. 88 (E. & A.1902); State v. Fiumara, 110 N.J.L. 164, 166, 164 A. 490 (E. & A. 1933); State v. Walker, 33 N.J. 580, 592, 166 A.2d 567 (19......
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State v. Craig, A--276
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