State v. Johnsey
| Decision Date | 20 February 1930 |
| Docket Number | A-7606. |
| Citation | 287 P. 729,46 Okla.Crim. 233 |
| Parties | STATE v. JOHNSEY. |
| Court | United States State Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma. Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma |
Syllabus by the Court.
Every person is entitled to equal protection of the law, and "equal protection of the law" means that equal protection and security shall be given to all under like circumstances in his life, his liberty, and his property, and in the pursuit of happiness, and in the exemption from any greater burdens and charges than are equally imposed upon all others under like circumstances.
While the Legislature in prescribing and fixing punishment for crime has very great latitude in classifying the same, still such classification should be natural, and not arbitrary, and should be made with reference to the heinousness and gravity of the act or acts made the crime, and not with reference to matters disconnected with the crime.
Additional Syllabus by Editorial Staff.
Comp St. 1921, § 8361, providing punishment for escape from state prison by imprisonment for term not exceeding double term for which prisoner was sentenced, held unconstitutional as based on arbitrary rather than a natural classification and denying equal protection of the law as required by Const. U.S. Amend. 14.
Appeal from District Court, Pittsburg County; Harve L. Melton Judge.
Prosecution by the State against J. R. Johnsey for the crime of escaping from the state prison. A demurrer to the information was sustained, and the State appeals.
Affirmed and defendant ordered discharged.
J. Berry King, Atty. Gen., and J. H. Lawson, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
Andrews & Aston, of McAlester, for defendant in error.
This is an appeal upon the part of the state from the district court of Pittsburg county, Okl., in which the court sustained a demurrer to the information filed against the defendant herein charging him with escape from the state penitentiary.
The statute under which this information was drawn is section 8361, C. O. S. 1921, and reads as follows: "Any person committed to a state prison who shall escape from or break said state prison with intent to escape therefrom, or who shall attempt by force or violence, or in any other manner, to escape from said prison, whether such escape be effected or not, shall upon conviction thereof be punished by imprisonment in said prison for a term not exceeding double the term for which he was so sentenced, to commence from and after the expiration of his former sentence."
The defendant filed the following demurrer to the information:
"1. That said information does not charge an offense under the laws of this state;
2. That the offense charged in said information under Section 8361 of the Compiled Laws of State of Oklahoma is contrary to law;
3. That the act under which this information is based is unconstitutional and contrary to the 14th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America."
The only question necessary to pass upon in this case is the constitutionality of section 8361, supra, which question is raised by the third subdivision of defendant's demurrer. Does this statute give equal protection to persons charged with violations thereof, or is it unreasonable or class legislation? It will be observed that the punishment to be inflicted under this statute depends entirely on the sentence the convict is serving at the time of the escape. The offense is not divided into grades, unless it can be said that the grade of the crime is fixed by the sentence from which the convict is escaping. It may be stated as a general proposition of law that every person is entitled to the equal protection of the law, and that equal protection of the law means that equal protection and security should be given to all under like circumstances in his life, his liberty, and his property, and in the pursuit of happiness, and in the exemption from any greater burden and charge than are equally imposed upon all others under like circumstances. Under this statute, there would be as many different grades of crime as there are prisoners undergoing different sentences. To say that the long-term convict commits a greater offense than the short-term convict is to base the punishment for such escape, not upon the act of escaping from a state prison, but upon the act of escaping from a punishment fixed by a court in the judgment of conviction. The statute in defining the offense, however, makes the escape from the state prison the offense, and not the escape from the punishment of the judgment fixed by the court upon trial. This classification is not natural, but arbitrary. To justify a...
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