6 Mo. App. 474 | Mo. Ct. App. | 1879
delivered the opinion of the court.
The petitioner complains that he is illegally restrained of his liberty by the jailer of the city of St. Louis. The return of the jailer shows that he has the body of the petitioner under authority of a commitment issued by the St. Louis Criminal Court. This commitment shows that the prisoner appeared before the grand jury as a witness and refused to answer interrogatories; that this fact was communicated by the grand jury, in writing, to the Criminal Court; that the court determined that the witness was bound to answer; that the prisoner persisted in his refusal and was thereupon brought into court, and still refused to
The Statute of Habeas Corpus makes it the duty of the court to which an application is made under the act, to remand the prisoner if detained in custody for any contempt specially and plainly charged in the commitment by some court or officer having authority to commit for contempt so charged. It is said by the Supreme Court, in Ex parte Toney, 11 Mo. 662: —
“ In deciding on the propriety of discharging a prisoner on habeas corpus, this court exercises no appellate jurisdiction. In the exercise of this power it is confined within the same limits which would restrain a judge of the County Court in its exercise. It can give no other or greater relief than is afforded by these officers. If the idea of all appellate jurisdiction is discarded, it will be obvious that neither this court nor any other court or officer can investigate the illegality of a judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction by a writ of habeas corpus. If the court has jurisdiction of the subject-matter and the person, although its proceedings may be irregular or erroneous, yet they cannot be set aside in this proceeding. In all collateral proceedings the judgment will be held conclusive.”
And the authorities altogether discountenance the idea that any tribunal can by a writ of habeas corpus practically reverse a judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction, and discharge a prisoner from its sentence. Williams’s Case, 26 Pa. St. 17; Re O’Connor, 6 Wis. 590; Re Callicott, 8 Blatchf. 89; Re Percy, 2 Daly, 539; Ex parte Hartman, 44 Cal. 32; Ex parte Parks, 3 Otto, 20; Ex parte Winston, 9 Nev. 76; Ex parte Sam, 51 Ala. 34; The People v. Hicks, 15 Barb. 162; Ex parte Watkins, 3 Pet. 202.
It is, however, provided in our Habeas Corpus Act that where the prisoner is in custody by virtue of a process from any court, the prisoner may be discharged “ where the
From the language of the statute and the nature of the ease, as is said by Roosevelt, J., in The People v. Hicks, supra, it is obvious that the Legislature, in allowing habeas corpus, did not intend that the officer issuing the writ should revise the decision of the committing magistrate and determine whether the party charged had or had not been guilty of the contempt alleged. The only question, therefore, that remains for our examination is whether the learned judge of the Criminal Court, whose power to commit for a contempt is incontestible, has in this case pronounced a sentence for which there is no warrant in law.
In commitment for contempt, where the imprisonment is intended merely as a punishment for the offence, it is usual for the commitment to specify some definite time, and it should do so whether or not there be a statute fixing the limit of imprisonment for contempt. But it has been long settled that where the design of the imprisonment is not merely or not mainly to punish the contempt, but to compel obedience to an order which the court has a right to
The commitment in the pi’esent case, therefore, was well enough unless it appears that by some statutory provision the power of the judges of courts of record in this State is restrained, and that, as to questions to which it is their duty to require an answer, the contempt committed in refusing to answer having been punished as prescribed by law, the judge has no further power in the premises, and the contumacious witness may thereafter persist in his refusal and set at defiance with impunity the lawful commandment of the court.
The Witness Act provides (Wag. Stats., sect. 18) that “a person summoned as a witness, and attending, who shall refuse to give evidence which may lawfully be required to be given by such person, on oath or affirmation, may be committed to prison by the court or other person authorized to take his deposition or testimony, there to remain without bail until he give such evidence.”
The plainness of this language leaves no room for construction. We have no right to nullify a law, to usurp the power of the Legislature, and to effect the judicial repeal of an enactment, by a construction against the letter and spirit and obvious meaning of the law. It is quite impossible to hold, in the teeth of this statutory provision, that a court has no power to order the imprisonment of a contumacious witness until he answers. It has been held by the Supreme Court, in Ex parte McKee, 18 Mo. 602, that under this provision a mere notary-public may commit a witness to prison until he will testify; and there is nothing in the language of the act from which it can be gathered that a notary has any other or greater power to compel a witness to give evidence than is given to courts of record.
- It is argued, indeed, that the provisions as to punishment for contempt under the statute, as to courts of record
We are referred to sects. 10, 11, 12 of the chapter in regard to grapd juries (Wag. Stats. 1082,1083), in accordance with which the present commitment was made. These sections provide that if a witness appearing before a grand, jury refuse to answer interrogatories, and persist in his refusal after the court has determined that he is bound to an
But a ease may present itself in which the court is satisfied that the ends of justice will be defeated unless the severer course is pursued. It may be that the witness has been discharged on bail, and has still refused to answer the questions at the next term of the court; and this may have gone on from term to term.
The power of the court is clear; and if it does not violate the law in the commitment, it is settled that neither the appellate court nor any other tribunal'can interfere by virtue of the Habeas Corpus Act. Where there is a contempt specially and plainly charged in the commitment by any officer having authority to commit for the contempt, the prisoner brought before the court by habeas corpus must be remanded unless the sentence was one not warranted by any provision of law. As to the circumstances of the commitment, except so far as they appear from the return, the tribunal before which the prisoner is brought on habeas corpus can know nothing. There is nothing in the present record from which we can see whether or not this witness has been already bailed ; and, for all that appears, it may be evident to the trial court that to sentence the witness to imprisonment and a fine, and then discharge him on bail, would be a mockery of justice. Of all this we can know nothing. On appeal we could not interfere with the discretion of the trial court unless it clearly appeared that there had been an abuse of that discretion. Much less can' we look into a question of that nature in a proceeding by habeas corpus. It is in the power of the trial court, as it shall think may best subserve the ends of justice, to discharge this witness or to sentence him for a limited period to jail on a new refusal to answer,