Territory Hawai`i v. Sabado, 2725.

• Decision Date: 20 April 1950
• Docket Number: No. 2725.,2725.
• Citation: 38 Haw. 486
• Parties: TERRITORY OF HAWAII v. PASTOR ALBERT SABADO.
• Court: Hawaii Supreme Court

38 Haw. 486

TERRITORY OF HAWAII

v.PASTOR ALBERT SABADO.

No. 2725.

Supreme Court of the Territory of Hawai‘i.

Submitted April 19, 1950.

Decided April 20, 1950.

ERROR TO CIRCUIT COURT FIRST CIRCUIT, HON. G. R. CORBETT, JUDGE.

Syllabus by the Court

Substantial compliance with the three statutory requirements for a minor to testify suffices under section 9836 of Revised Laws of Hawaii 1945.

O. P. Soares for defendant–plaintiff in error.

M. Chan, Assistant Public Prosecutor for the Territory, plaintiff–defendant in error.

KEMP, C. J., LE BARON AND TOWSE, JJ.

OPINION OF THE COURT BY LE BARON, J.

On information, the defendant was charged and convicted by a jury of the crime of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. At his trial he neither took the stand nor presented any evidence in defense. He appealed by way of writ of error.

In the opening brief the defendant by his counsel abandons four of his eight assignments of error and relies on the remaining four. The alleged errors thereof challenge the competency of two minors, aged eighteen and fourteen, respectively, to testify against the defendant, the admissibility of two confessions of the defendant and the adjudging of him to be guilty. Although the opening brief shows that the points of law presented therein involve the application of statutes to undisputed facts, it does not purport to support those points with any citation of authorities other than that of the statutes. Nor are they seriously argued therein. To that brief the Territory filed an answering brief which ably demonstrates by authorities of both statutes and decided cases as well as by argument that such presented points of law are not well taken. The defendant filed no reply brief and submits his cause on the opening and answering briefs without oral argument.

This court finds that the assignments of error as relied upon are so frivolous in nature that no useful purpose would be served to set them forth. Suffice it to say that only the assignments challenging the competency of the minors merit further consideration in order that the general subject of such competency may be clarified and that this court deems it proper to do so for that purpose.

Section 9836 of Revised Laws of Hawaii 1945 authorizes a court on the trial of an issue to receive the evidence of a minor in any suit, action or proceeding, irrespective of whether or not the particular minor “be destitute of the knowledge of God and of any belief in religion or in a future state of rewards and punishments.” But it sets forth three requirements to be met in orderly sequence before such evidence can be received lawfully. The first requirement is that the court must caution the minor “that he will incur and be liable to punishment if he does not tell the truth.” The second is that the minor must affirm or declare that he will “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” or must do so “in such other form as may be approved of and allowed by such court * * *.” The third and last requirement is that it must be proved to the trial court's satisfaction “that such minor perfectly understands the nature and object of such declaration or affirmation * * * and the purpose for which his testimony is...