71 Mich. 335 | Mich. | 1888
Respondent was tried and convicted in tbe police court of Grand Rapids for violating tbe Sunday clause of the liquor law of 1887, by which act such violation is made a misdemeanor, and punished by fine and imprisonment beyond the jurisdiction of a justice. Respondent appealed to the circuit court of Kent county, where he raised, as he had done before, the question of jurisdiction. This was ruled against him, and he was again convicted.
The Grand Rapids police court was originally intended to exercise the jurisdiction of justices of the peace in criminal cases, and some special jurisdiction. In 1885 an attempt was made to confer exclusive jurisdiction over all misdemeanors committed in Grand Rapids.
The liquor law of 1887 was intended to remove the trial of offenses under it into the higher courts, where the proceedings are conducted by common-law methods, and the rights of the public and of the prisoner fully guarded. There is, however, nothing said in the liquor law about courts. The jurisdiction follows the general statutes. The offense in question is made a misdemeanor by express terms.
It would probably come within the language of the police court act of Grand Rapids. But there are difficulties in the way of allowing this which are very serious.
The general policy of the State divides the original
While our Constitution provides some discretion in regard to criminal jurisdiction of justices, it gives' to the circuit courts original jurisdiction except as otherwise provided, and it gives them general appellate powers over all inferior tribunals. It also secures the right of trial by jury, and several other important safeguards against abuses. This right of trial by jury means more than that there shall be a trial before a body of laymen. It involves all the incidents of common-law jury trials, including challenges to the array and to the poll, peremptory and for cause, the assistance of counsel, the enforced attendance of witnesses, the separation of court and jury powers, and whatever else is essential on hearing or review. And under the Constitution it requires substantial equality throughout the State in methods of prosecution.
We have misdemeanors which involve consequences as
This police court must be put upon the same footing with justices’ courts in criminal cases, or it must have unlimited jurisdiction over, all .crimes but felonies. There is no middle ground.
With the exception of a few pieces of machinery, it cannot be distinguished from other justices’ courts, and it gets most of its powers from the statutes. regulating justices. In case an indictment is found for. misdemeanor, the law provides no means for getting it into the police court; and if it did, we should have the singular spectacle of a case transferred to an inferior court for trial by a court having appellate jurisdiction over it, and original jurisdiction over the same offenses outside of the corporation. There is no provision for preliminary examinations, and none for filing informations. The prosecuting attorney is bound to attend on call of the court, but he does not appear to have been given any independent power. The practice is required to conform to that of justices of the peace. The court has no power to assign counsel, or to secure to the prisoner his witnesses from outside the city, or such a jury as he is entitled to demand.
The statute which attempts to give this court jurisdiotion over misdemeanors in general cannot exercise that
We think the police court could not try the offense charged, and that the proceedings should be reversed, and the respondent discharged.
See Act No. 127, Laws of 1885, § 6.