State v. Johnson, 40697.
| Decision Date | 20 June 1931 |
| Docket Number | No. 40697.,40697. |
| Parties | STATE v. JOHNSON. |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from District Court, Jones County; Atherton B. Clark, Judge.
The defendant was charged with the crime of escape. A demurrer to the indictment was overruled. Defendant refused to plead further, was adjudged guilty and sentenced to the reformatory at Anamosa, and now prosecutes this appeal.
Affirmed.
John H. Meyers, of Waterloo, for appellant.
John Fletcher, Atty. Gen., Neill Garrett, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Clifford B. Paul, Co. Atty., of Anamosa, for the State.
The indictment in this cause, waiving formal parts, is as follows: “The said Alfred Johnson on or about the 1st day of October in the year of Our Lord One Thousand Nine Hundred and Twenty Two in the County aforesaid did willfully and unlawfully escape from custody, he, the said Alfred Johnson, having been paroled from the Men's Reformatory, Anamosa, Iowa, where, he, the said Alfred Johnson, was committed, did thereafter depart without written consent of the Board of Parole from the territory within which, by the terms of said parole, he was restricted, he, the said Alfred Johnson, then and there did willfully and unlawfully escape from custody, contrary to and in violation of Section 4897-a, Code 1913.”
[1][2][3] The appellant demurred thereto on the following grounds:
“First: For the reason that it does not substantially conform to the requirements of the Code of 1913, in that the manner and circumstances of the crime charged are not specifically set forth therein so that the accused may be advised in order to properly present his defense, and that a judgment thereon could be pleaded in bar to a future indictment for the same offense; that under the language used in the indictment the State might sustain every allegation and yet the accused be innocent of being a parole violator.
Two: That said indictment contains a matter if true would constitute a legal defense or bar to the prosecution.”
An indictment in this identical form was held invalid on demurrer in State v. Frear, 199 Iowa, 63, 203 N. W. 255.
This would be controlling in the instant case were it not for the provisions of chapter 266 of the Acts of the Forty-Third General Assembly. Said act provides:
“Sec. 2. The indictment may charge, and is valid and sufficient if it charges, the offense for which the accused is being prosecuted in one or more of the following ways:
(1) By using the name given to the offense by statute.
(2) By stating so much of the definition of the offense, either in terms of the common law or of the statute defining the offense, or in terms of substantially the same meaning, as is sufficient to give the court and the accused notice of what offense is intended to be charged.
The indictment may refer to a section or sub-section of any statute creating the crime charged therein, and in determining the validity or sufficiency of such indictment regard shall be had to such reference.”
Section 4 of said act provides for furnishing a defendant with a bill of particulars.
[4] It is contended by appellant that said chapter 266 is not applicable to this case. The offense is charged to have been committed on the 1st day of October, 1922. The indictment was returned on the 30th day of January, 1924. The said chapter 266 became effective July 4, 1929. The appellant's demurrer was filed on the 9th day of October, 1930. Appellant contends that said chapter 266 is ex post facto as to him under the facts stated.
In State v. Wilson, 193 Iowa, 297, 186 N. W. 886, 887, we considered a case where a defendant was charged with the crime of escape...
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State v. Byrnes
...Constitution. Although we have approved the statute, State v. Wilson, 193 Iowa 297, 298, 299, 186 N.W. 886, 887; State v. Johnson, 212 Iowa 1197, 1200, 237 N.W. 522, 523, we have not had occasion to examine it with this particular constitutional challenge in mind. Michigan has been confront......