Williams v. State

• Decision Date: 01 September 1984
• Docket Number: No. 35,35
• Citation: 490 A.2d 1277,302 Md. 787
• Parties: James M. WILLIAMS, a/k/a Ike Brown v. STATE of Maryland. ,
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 787

302 Md. 787

490 A.2d 1277

James M. WILLIAMS, a/k/a Ike Brown v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 35, Sept. Term, 1984.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

April 24, 1985.

Julia A. Doyle Bernhardt, Asst. Public Defender, Baltimore (Alan H. Murrell, Public Defender, Baltimore, on the brief), for appellant.

Valerie V. Cloutier, Asst. Atty. Gen., Baltimore (Stephen H. Sachs, Atty. Gen., Zvi Greismann, Asst. Atty. Gen., Kurt L. Schmoke, State's Atty. for Baltimore City and Reid Rubin, Asst. State's Atty., for Baltimore City, Baltimore, on the brief), for appellee.

Argued before MURPHY, C.J., and SMITH, ELDRIDGE, COLE, RODOWSKY and COUCH, JJ., and JAMES C. MORTON, Jr., Associate Judge of the Court of Special Appeals (retired), Specially Assigned.

MURPHY, Chief Judge.

The question presented is whether the Circuit Court for Baltimore City was without jurisdiction to try appellant for robbery with a deadly weapon where the charging document failed expressly to allege an intent by the accused permanently to deprive the owner of her property.

I.

The appellant was charged by criminal information as follows:

"The State's Attorney for Baltimore City, duly authorized by law, on his official oath informs the said Court that the above named Defendant(s), late of said City, heretofore on or about the date of offense set forth above, at the location set forth above, in the City of Baltimore, State of Maryland, unlawfully with a dangerous and deadly weapon did rob the Complainant of the aforesaid property, incorporated herein by reference as Exhibit A, contrary to the form of the Act of Assembly, in such case made and provided, and against the peace, government and dignity of the State."

Factual data elaborating upon the allegations of the charging document was contained in the title and caption of the information; it identified the accused, specified the date and location of the offense, the name of the victim and the nature of the property stolen ($20 current money).

The appellant made no objection at or during trial to the sufficiency or form of the charge contained in the criminal information. Upon his conviction of robbery with a deadly weapon, he appealed to the Court of Special Appeals. He contended that the information failed to state an offense and hence was fatally defective for lack of jurisdiction in the circuit court because it did not allege every essential element of the crime charged, i.e., it failed to assert an intent on appellant's part permanently to deprive the victim of her property. We granted certiorari prior to decision by the intermediate appellate court to consider the significant issue raised in the case.

II.

A primary purpose of a charging document is to fulfill the constitutional requirement contained in Article 21 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights that each person charged with a crime must be informed of the accusation against him. ¹ State v. Morton, 295 Md. 487, 490, 456 A.2d 909 (1983); Jackson v. State, 231 Md. 591, 596, 191 A.2d 432 (1963); Lank v. State, 219 Md. 433, 436, 149 A.2d 367 (1959). More particularly, the purposes served by the constitutional requirement include (1) putting the accused on notice of what he is called upon to defend by characterizing and describing the crime and conduct; (2) protecting the accused from a future prosecution for the same offense; (3) enabling the accused to prepare for his trial; (4) providing a basis for the court to consider the legal sufficiency of the charging document; and (5) informing the court of the specific crime charged so that, if required, sentence may be pronounced in accordance with the right of the case. Ayre v. State, 291 Md. 155, 163-64, 433 A.2d 1150 (1981). We have repeatedly emphasized that every criminal charge must, first, characterize the crime; and, second, it must provide such description of the criminal act alleged to have been committed as will inform the accused of the specific conduct with which he is charged, thereby enabling him to defend against the accusation and avoid a second prosecution for the same criminal offense. State v. Morton, 295 Md. at 491, 456 A.2d 909; Brown v. State, 285 Md. 105, 109, 400 A.2d 1133 (1979); State v. Canova, 278 Md. 483, 498-99, 365 A.2d 988 (1976); State v. Lassotovitch, 162 Md. 147, 156, 159 A. 362 (1932).

It is fundamental that a court is without power to render a verdict or impose a sentence under a charging document which does not charge an offense within its jurisdiction prescribed by common law or by statute. State v. Canova, supra, 278 Md. at 498, 365 A.2d 988; Putnam v State, 234 Md. 537, 540-41 n. 1, 200 A.2d 59 (1964); Baker v. State, 6 Md.App. 148, 151, 250 A.2d 677 (1969). Manifestly, where no cognizable crime is charged, the court lacks fundamental subject matter jurisdiction to render a judgment of conviction, i.e., it is powerless in such circumstances to inquire into the facts, to apply the law, and to declare the punishment for an offense. See Pulley v. State, 287 Md. 406, 415-16, 412 A.2d 1244 (1980); Urciolo v. State, 272 Md. 607, 616, 325 A.2d 878 (1974).

Under Maryland Rule 4-252(a) (formerly Rule 736a), a motion alleging a "defect" in the charging document "other than its failure to show jurisdiction in the court or its failure to charge an offense" must be filed within a designated time period prior to trial or the defect is waived. ² The rule provides in subsection (c) that a motion "asserting failure of the charging document to show jurisdiction in the court or to charge an offense may be raised and determined at any time." A claim that a charging document fails to charge or characterize an offense is jurisdictional and may be raised, as here, for the first time on appeal. See Putnam, supra; Baker, supra; Maryland Rule 885. Where the claimed defect is not jurisdictional, it must be seasonably raised before the trial court or it is waived.

III.

Robbery is a common law offense in Maryland and is within the jurisdiction of the circuit courts of the State. The crime is defined as the felonious taking and carrying away of the personal property of another from his person by the use of violence or by putting in fear. See Stebbing v. State, 299 Md. 331, 351, 473 A.2d 903 (1984); State v. Gover, 267 Md. 602, 606, 298 A.2d 378 (1973); Hadder v. State, 238 Md. 341, 354, 209 A.2d 70 (1965). The word "felonious" when used in connection with the taking of property means a taking with the intent to steal. R. Perkins, Criminal Law 2nd ed. 279-80.

The information in this case charged that appellant unlawfully, with a dangerous and deadly weapon, did "rob" the named victim, at a specified time, and at a place within this State of $20. We think that these averments sufficiently charged and characterized the crime of armed robbery and thereby invested the circuit court with jurisdiction to try the offense. In common parlance, the word "rob" means "to take something away from (a person) by force: steal from ... [;] to take personal property from (the person or presence of another) feloniously and by violence or threat of violence." Webster's Third New International Dictionary 1964 (1976). The averment that the defendant "did rob" the victim plainly implies that the crime was committed with intent permanently to deprive the owner of her property.

As the criminal information sufficiently characterized the crime of armed robbery, it was not defective for lack of jurisdiction in the circuit court. Although the customary method of identifying the particular crime charged has been to aver its essential elements in the charging document, that is not the exclusive method, and the use of other words that sufficiently characterize the crime will satisfy the jurisdictional requirement. See Putnam v. State, supra, 234 Md. at 541, 544-45, 200 A.2d 59. This does not mean that the charging document will be immune from attack, for it may otherwise be deficient in failing to fully inform the accused of the specific conduct with which he is charged, and in that event a timely motion pursuant to Rule 4-252(a) may be filed. ³

Neither Ayre v. State nor Canova v. State, both supra, upon which appellant places reliance, requires that we find the charging document in this case to be jurisdictionally defective as failing to charge an offense. In each of those cases averments essential to characterizing a statutory crime were completely omitted from the charging documents. We there concluded that motions to dismiss the indictments filed prior to trial should have been granted. As no such motion was filed in the present case, we need not consider whether the charging document was defective on a non-jurisdictional ground.

JUDGMENT AFFIRMED, WITH COSTS.

COLE, J., dissents.

COLE, Judge, dissenting.

For close to two centuries the people in this State have been secure in the knowledge that they would not be subjected to trial on a criminal charging document that did not fully set forth the essential elements of the crime charged. Today, with no reasoned analysis to support its decision, the majority by judicial fiat wipes away that protection against unlawful official conduct. I, therefore, dissent.

The majority recognizes, as it must, that our prior decisions have made clear that Article 21 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights guarantees to each citizen the right to be informed of the accusation against him. Of the many purposes served by this constitutional requirement, two of the most important are to put the defendant on notice of what he is called upon to defend by characterizing and describing the crime, and to protect the defendant from future prosecution for the same charge.

The majority further acknowledges that our cases have held that where no cognizable offense is charged the court is deprived of jurisdiction to render a judgment of conviction or to impose a sentence of punishment, and that the defendant may attack the conviction and sentence at any time, including for the...