Appellant was convicted of aiding a prisoner to escápe, in violation of article 229, Penal Code, and fined $50.
Article 229, Penal Code, reads as follows: “If any рerson shall willfully aid a prisoner to escape from the custody of an officer, by whom he is legally detainеd in custody on an accusation for a misdemeanоr, by doing an act calculated to effect that object, he shall be punished by fine,” etc. Appellant’s сontention is that this article has no application to the facts adduced in evidence, and that under thе testimony he is not guilty of violating it. The uncontroverted evidеnce is that appellant’s principal had beеn convicted in three cases of misdemeanor, аnd placed in charge of the proper officer, and was being worked upon the road as a county convict under these convictions at the time of his escape. The ¡State’s contention is that the terms оf article 229 apply as well to defendants after conviction as pending prosecution, and it cites in support of this article 240, Penal Code, which provides: “Thе word 'accusation,’ as used here, and in every pаrt of this code, means a charge made in a lawful mаnner against any person, that he has been guilty of some offense, which subjects him to prosecution in the namе of the State. A person is said to be 'accused’ оf an offense from the time that any 'criminal action’ shall have been commenced against him. A legal arrest without warrant; a complaint to a magistrate; a warrant legally issued; and indictment, or an information, are аll examples of 'accusation,’ and a person proceeded against by either of these is said to be 'accused.’ ” As we understand an “accusation” undеr our statute, it applies to a pending proseсution, and when that prosecution has been terminated in a conviction it ceases to be ■ an accusation. After a conviction or the judgment of guilty, a party is termed a “convict” when he has acceptеd
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the sentence or judgment of conviction as a finality, which has been adjudged against him by the court of last resort which has jurisdiction of his case to which lie may have thought proper to appeal. Art. 27, Penal Code; Arcia v. State, 26 Texas Crim. App., 193; Woods v. State, 26 Texas Crim. Apр., 490; Jones v. State,
The judgment is reversed, and the cause remanded.
Reversed and remanded.