Summary
In Roberts v. State, 186 Miss. 732, 191 So. 823 (1939), the defendant was apprehended in another state by Mississippi law enforcement officers and forcibly returned to Mississippi.
Summary of this case from Atwell v. StateOpinion
No. 33665.
November 6, 1939.
CRIMINAL LAW.
The jurisdiction of the court in the county where crime was committed was not impaired by manner in which accused was brought before it, and hence court did not lack jurisdiction of person of accused merely because he was allegedly apprehended in another state, without valid process and, over his protest, was forcibly and unlawfully returned to the state.
APPEAL from the circuit court of Oktibbeha County; HON. JOHN C. STENNIS, Judge.
John D. Greene, Jr., of Starkville, and Rush H. Knox, of Jackson, for appellant.
The appellant in this case was a resident citizen of the State of Arkansas and had never been in any trouble or convicted of any crime except a few misdeameanor cases and for being drunk. He was apprehended and brought to the State of Mississippi for trial over his objections without legal process as provided by law. Our state so far as I have been able to find has not passed on this question but other states have.
In re Robinson, 29 Neb. 135, the court held: a person accused of committing a crime in Nebraska was arrested in Kansas by the order of a Kansas justice of the peace and delivered to a Nebraska constable, who forcibly and against the will of the accused, and without any warrant, requisition or other legal process, conveyed the accused out of the state of Kansas into Nebraska. Holding that the Nebraska court was without jurisdiction, the court said: "In principle there is no difference between the case at bar and where a person is held for an offense other than the one he was extradited for. In either case it is an abuse of judicial process, which the law does not allow. Ample provisions are made for the arrest and return of a person accused of crime, who has fled to a sister state, by extradition warrants issued by the executives of the states. There is no excuse for a citizen or officer arresting without authority of law, a fugitive, and taking him forcibly and against his will into the jurisdiction of the state for the purpose of prosecution. We cannot sanction the method adopted to bring the petitioner into the jurisdiction of this state. He did not come into the state voluntarily, but because he could not avoid it. The district court, therefore, did not acquire jurisdiction of the person of the petitioner and his detention is unlawful."
45 N.W. 267; 8 L.R.A. 398; 14 Am. Jur. 919, Sec. 217; 18 A.L.R. 509; 15 L.R.A. 177.
W.D. Conn, Jr., Assistant Attorney-General, for the State.
On motion for new trial one of the grounds assigned was that appellant was forcibly brought into this state from Arkansas without any legal process therefor. The way or manner in which a fugitive is brought back into this state from another state can have no effect upon the jurisdiction of the court to try him after he has been brought back.
Mahon v. Justice, 127 U.S. 700, 32 L.Ed. 283; Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S. 437, 30 L.Ed. 421.
The appellant here was jointly indicted with Jack Holt and John S. Ware, and on being separately tried each was convicted. The facts are set forth in the opinions rendered a week ago in Holt v. State, Miss., 191 So. 673, and Ware v. State, Miss., 191 So. 678.
In the instant case the point is made that appellant was apprehended in another State, without any valid legal process therefor, and that over his protest, he was forcibly and unlawfully returned to this State, and that because thereof the courts here are without jurisdiction of the person. Appellant relies on the case In re Robinson, 29 Neb. 135, 45 N.W. 267, 8 L.R.A. 398, 26 Am. St. Rep. 378.
We do not agree with the conclusion in the cited case but align ourselves with the great weight of authority which is that the jurisdiction of the court in the county where the crime was committed is in no way impaired by the manner in which the accused was brought before it. A sufficient number of the cases are gathered in the notes 14 Am. Jur., pp. 919, 920.
Affirmed.