Territory v. Barela.

• Decision Date: 22 August 1910
• Citation: 110 P. 845,15 N.M. 520
• Parties: TERRITORYv.BARELA.
• Court: New Mexico Supreme Court

15 N.M. 520

110 P. 845

TERRITORY

v.BARELA.

Supreme Court of the Territory of New Mexico.

Aug. 22, 1910.

Syllabus by the Court.

A term of a district court in this territory begun and held by any judge, as required by law, for a county in the district, continues in existence until the day fixed by law for the beginning of another term of that court for the same county, unless sooner adjourned without day, although another term of the same court for another county has been held, as required by law, in the meantime, by the same or another judge.

Appeal from District Court, Doña Ana County; before Justice Frank W. Parker.

Juan Barela was convicted of murder, and he appeals. Affirmed.

A term of a district court begun and held by a judge as required by law for a county in the district continues until the day fixed by law for the beginning of another term of that court for the same county unless sooner adjourned without day, though another term of the same court for another county has been held as required by law in the meantime.

The appellant was convicted of murder in Doña Ana county, in the Third judicial district, May 15, 1909. After verdict and before sentence, a motion in arrest of judgment was made on the ground that the term of court begun for said county as provided by law, April 5, 1909, expired by limitation of law, May 3, 1909, on which date, according to the provisions of chapter 89, Sess. Laws 1905, a term of court was to begin in Sierra county in said district. A term did in fact begin there, with another associate justice presiding by request of the district judge. The appellant claims that thereby the term of court in Doña Ana county ended and his trial was a nullity. The motion in arrest of judgment was overruled and the defendant was sentenced. From that action of the district court he appealed to this court.

W. H. H. Llewellyn, for appellant. F. W. Clancy, Atty. Gen., for the Territory.

ABBOTT, J. (after stating the facts as above).

In his exhaustive brief for the territory, the Attorney General maintains that there are two kinds of district courts in this territory-one, the district courts established directly by Congress, whose districts embrace several counties each; and the other kind created by territorial statutes, each of which is a court for a specific county and not for any other county, and that there is a district court of Doña Ana county wholly distinct from the district court of Sierra county. If this contention is correct and the reasoning in support of it is strong, the appellant is left wholly without standing ground. But even if it be granted that the court which assumed to try the appellant was the court of the Third district, sitting for the trial of causes in Doña Ana county, there remains to bar the appellant's way to a new trial the recent decision of this court in Territory v. Armijo, 14 N. M. 210, 89 Pac. 268, in which practically the same question now raised was decided adversely to the appellant's position, and in which the court said: “The beginning of the term is fixed by law for each county. Its end comes only by adjournment, or by the arrival of the date designated by law for the beginning of another term of the same court, for the same county.” That decision was based largely on Borrego v. Territory, 8 N. M. 446, 46 Pac. 349, in which it was held in effect that merely constructive interference of one term with another does not terminate the existence of either, or render anything invalid done by the court at the term in progress, after the time for a term in another county of the district arrives. That decision was upheld in Gonzales v. Cunningham, 164 U. S. 626, 17 Sup. Ct. 187 (41 L. Ed. 572), in which the court said: “There was nothing in any of these provisions which controlled the discretion of the trial judge, in continuing any special...