Trimble v. Commonwealth
| Decision Date | 23 March 1899 |
| Citation | 32 S.E. 786,96 Va. 818 |
| Parties | TRIMBLE. v. COMMONWEALTH. |
| Court | Virginia Supreme Court |
Contempt—Constitutional Law—Review—
Habeas Corpus.
1. Acts 1897-98, p. 548, providing for punishment for contempt of court, is constitutional so far as it gives the supreme court jurisdiction to review the judgment of the court below on writ of error.
2. The court, in habeas corpus to recover a child, remanded the child to respondent's custody until further orders, and, with the court's consent, she took the child out of the state on a visit to her sister, on whose suggestion and the advice of counsel a competent court of the foreign state appointed, as guardian of the child, the sister, who made a beneficial arrangement for the child's nurture. There was no showing that this was done to defeat the jurisdiction of the first court. Held, that the action did not amount to a contempt.
Error to corporation court of Lynchburg.
Ella Trimble was adjudged guilty of contempt of court, and she brings error. Reversed.
H. M. Ford and R. D. Yancey, for plaintiff in error.
The Attorney General, for the Commonwealth.
KEITH, P. One Susie Fox filed her petition in the corporation court for the city of Lynchburg, alleging that she is the mother of a female child five years of age, named Lillian May Fox; that she had theretofore placed this child with a certain Ella Trimble to keep and care for during the petitioner's expected absence from the city of Lynchburg, with the understanding that the child would be delivered to her on her return. Ella Trimble refused, upon the mother's demand, to restore the child to her custody, and thereupon this petition was filed, praying for a writ of habeas corpus. A rule to show cause against the writ was issued, and, upon the answer made by Ella Trimble, the court entered the following order:
On the 22d of March, 1898, the following order was entered in this proceeding:
"It is ordered that the defendant, Ella Trimble, do produce the body of Lillian May Fox in court on the first day of the next term of the said corporation court for the city of Lynchburg, and show cause, if any she can, why the said order heretofore made on the said 10th day of May, 1897, should not be revoked."
In compliance with this order, Ella Trimble filed her answer, in which she states the proceedings up to that time, and then goes on to say that when the case was before the court in May, 1897, and the child was remanded to her custody, she understood it to be the wish of the court that she should either place the child in some private family, or at a school where it would be properly cared for; that, in order to effect this object, she went with the child to Wake county, N. C, where, at the suggestion of her sister, Mollie Trimble, and acting under the advice of counsel, a guardian, upon motion of her sister, was appointed by the superior court of that county; that the child had since been placed with one W. E. Bonner, who the evidence shows to be a kind-hearted, honest, and industrious citizen. Respondent further states that, "when she took this child, it was in a sick and starving condition, when neither the law, nor any person on its behalf, gave it any attention; that she has spent more than a year of sleepless and anxious nights in watching and coaxing the little spark of vitality into life"; and that the child has gradually improved under her care. The answer further avers that she is unable to comply with the mandate of the...
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Hopkins v. City Of Richmond
...the invalid subdivisions and uphold the validity of the remaining sections. Black v. Trower, 79 Va. 123, 127; Trimble v. Commonwealth, 96 Va. 819, 821, 32 S. E. 786; Robertson v. Preston, 97 Va. 296, 300, 301, 33 S. E. 618; Berea College v. Kentucky, 211 U. S. 45, 54, 55, 29 Sup. Ct 33, 53 ......
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