State v. White
| Decision Date | 07 October 1925 |
| Docket Number | No. 2.,2. |
| Citation | 130 A. 470 |
| Parties | STATE v. WHITE. |
| Court | New Jersey Supreme Court |
Error to Court of Quarter Sessions, Passaic County.
William White was convicted of criminal abuse of a girl under the age of 12 years, and he brings error. Affirmed.
Argued May term, 1925, before GUMMERE, C. J., and KALISCH and CAMPBELL, JJ.
Stein & Stein, of Paterson, for plaintiff in error.
J. W. De Yoe, Prosecutor of the Pleas, of Paterson, for the State.
The defendant in this case, a man 25 years of age, was indicted for criminal abuse of a girl under the age of 12 years. He pleaded nonvult to the indictment. The court thereupon sentenced him to be confined in the state's prison at hard labor for a maximum term of 7 years and a minimum term of 4 years. On the same day the court, of its own motion, vacated this sentence, and ordered the defendant to be confined in the State's prison at hard labor for the maximum term of 30 years and the minimum term of 20 years.
The first ground upon which we are asked to reverse this conviction is that the sentence finally pronounced is in excess of the term permitted by the statute; counsel for the defendant asserting that the maximum penalty for the crime charged in the indictment is fixed by the statute at 15 years. An examination of the statute itself shows that this contention is without basis of fact. Section 115 of our Crimes Act (Comp. Stat, p. 1783), provides that "any person who, * * * being of the age of 16 or over, shall unlawfully and carnally abuse a woman child under the age of 12 years, with or without her consent, shall be guilty of a high misdemeanor and punished by a fine not exceeding $5,000, or imprisonment at hard labor not exceeding 30 years, or both." In the present case the averment of the indictment was that the child who had been carnally abused by the defendant was under the age of 12 years; and the defendant by his plea admitted this fact.
The only other ground of reversal urged before us is that the trial court was without power to change the sentence after it had once been pronounced. We consider this contention unsound. After sentence has been pronounced, and the defendant has begun the service of that sentence, the court is powerless thereafter to change it by increasing the term of imprisonment; but the court may alter the sentence in its discretion and on its own motion at any time during the term and before the defendant has begun serving the sentence originally pronounced. This...
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Ex parte Sabongy
...Caprio v. Mother Superior of Home of Good Shepherd of Newark, 91 N.J.L. 14, 102 A. 459 (Sup.Ct.1917); State v. White, 130 A. 470, 3 N.J.Misc. 1016 (Sup.Ct.1925), affirmed 103 N.J.L. 153, 134 A. 746 (E. & Thus, considering the amended commitments as having been responsive to a direction by t......
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State v. Moore
...prohibition against increases in sentences does not apply until a defendant begins serving his sentence. See State v. White, 3 N.J.Misc. 1016, 1017-1018, 130 A. 470 (Sup.Ct.1925), aff'd 103 N.J.L. 153, 134 A. 736 (E. & A. 1926); State v. Ryan, 171 N.J.Super. 427, 435, 409 A.2d 821 (App.Div.......
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State v. Weeks, A--59
...next contends that, in correcting the illegal sentence, the lower Court had no authority to increase it, citing State v. White, 130 A. 470, 3 N.J.Misc. 1016, 1017 (Sup.Ct.1925) affirmed 103 N.J.L. 153, 134 A. 746 (E. & A. 1926) and Caprio v. Home of Good Shepherd of Newark, 91 N.J.L. 14, 10......