170 Pa. 426 | Pa. | 1895
Opinion by
Emma E. Gelbert was convicted by a magistrate of selling soda water and candy on Sunday, and was required to pay four dollars and the costs or undergo six days’ imprisonment in the county jail. The record of the conviction was removed by certiorari to the court of common pleas of Lackawanna county. The judgment of the magistrate was reversed by that court on the ground of .substantial defects in the written complaint on which the proceedings were instituted. The defect that was deemed fatal was the omission to charge in the complaint gny offense known to the law. The question before us is whether it is essential to the validity of a conviction under section 1 of the act of April 22, 1794, that the written complaint should affirmative^ show, on its face, that the act complained of was performed on Sunday. The commonwealth contends it is not and that, although the complaint fails to disclose any offense punishable by law, it is good if by reference to the almanac and the docket entries it can be satisfactoria ascer
It was therefore necessary to the jurisdiction of the magistrate and the validity of his warrant that the complaint should distinctly state that the work mentioned in it was performed on Sunday. It is not sufficient in such case that it may appear from the evidence on the trial or by reference to the almanac that it was so performed. The complaint is the foundation of the proceeding and the jurisdictional facts must appear on its face by a plain statement of them. Neither the warrant nor the docket entries can supply them or dispense with their presence there. It is claimed by the commonwealth’s counsel that this view of the subject is purely technical, but we cannot so regard it. The defect complained of is substantial and jurisdictional. A like defect in an indictment is ground for arresting judgment upon it, and it seems reasonable that such a defect in the complaint which is the'basis of a summary proceeding should vitiate the latter. In Pennsylvania none of the common law or statutory essentials of a summary conviction have been yielded, and they seem “ to be as necessary to bound arbitrary power and prevent oppression and injustice to the citizen of a republic, as to the subject of a crown.” Commonwealth v. Borden, 61 Pa. 272.
Judgment affirmed.