State v. Marvin Davis.
| Citation | 91 W.Va. 241 |
| Decision Date | 16 May 1922 |
| Docket Number | No. 4511.,4511. |
| Parties | State v. Marvin Davis. |
| Court | Supreme Court of West Virginia |
Jury Verdict will be Set Aside and Judgment Reversed Where
Some of the Veniremen Were Disqualified.
Upon the trial of one indicted for stealing the goods of a railway company, the employees of such company are prima facie disqualified to be placed upon the panel of twenty required by law, or to sit on the jury of twelve selected therefrom tot try the case; and the verdict of a jury so impaneled and constituted in whole or in part of such disqualified veniremen, if objected to, will be set aside, and the judgment thereon reversed.
Error to Circuit Court, Summers County. Marvin Davis was convicted of stealing goods, and he brings error.
Reversed, and remanded.
Wm. II. Sawyers and T. J. Lilly, for plaintiff in error. E. T. England, Attorney General, and R. Dennis Steed, Assistant Attorney General, for the State.
The defendant was indicted, tried and convicted of stealing certain goods, the property of the Chesapeak and Ohio Railway Company, of the value of more than twenty dollars, and was sentenced to the penitentiary for the period of two years.
The only error urged or argued here by defendant's counsel is that the court below overruled his objection to six of the panel of jurors and allowed three of them, admittedly employees of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway Company, to he sworn to try the case, and who did sit on the trial thereof and participate in the verdict against him.
What the evidence taken on their voir dire, if any, may have shown regarding the other qualifications of these jurors the record does not show; but if the main objection is good, the other facts become immaterial.
In the recent case of State v. Dushman, 79 W. Va. 747, the defendant objected to employees of the railway company being included in the panel of twenty jurors from which he was called upon to exercise his right of peremptory challenge. We decided in that case that the error was fatal to the trial, though none of the employees of the railway company were chosen or sat as jurors on the trial, because under the rules of the common law defendant was entitled to a panel of twenty qualified jurors before being required to exercise his right of peremptory challenge. And we held in that case what is particularly applicable here, namely, that an employee of a railway company prima facie is disqualified to sit as a juror on the trial...
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State v. Wilcox, 14658
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