Penal settlement

“ It is conceded that, under the general principles of the common law, the repeal of a penal statute operates as a remission of all penalties for violations of it committed before its repeal, and a release from prosecution therefor after said repeal, unless there be either a clause in the repealing statute, or a provision of some other statute expressly authorizing such prosecution. ”

“ Division, and that Courts, when satisfied that a person convicted on indictment of an offence punishable by penal servitude after more than two previous convictions on indictment, was leading a persistently dishonest or criminal life, and that it was expedient for the protection of the public that he should be kept in detention for a term of years, should have power, after passing a sentence of penal servitude for not less than seven years, to order that he should pass a certain period of his sentence in the Habitual Offenders' Division. ”

“ If that court was without jurisdiction, by reason of the paramount authority of the constitution and laws of the United States, to compel the plaintiff in error, in response to the writ of habeas corpus, to produce the prisoner, then his committal for contempt was the denial of a right, privilege, and immunity secured by the supreme law of the land. The claim by the plaintiff in error that there was such a denial constitutes the foundation of our jurisdiction. ”

“ The older statute had imposed a penalty for certain offences,-namely, obstructing a claimant in arresting a fugitive from labor, rescuing the fugitive after his arrest, or harboring and concealing him with knowledge that the was a fugitive; and the statute had enacted that the claimant might recover the penalty for his own benefit, and also reserved to him a right of action in damages for the actual injuries he might have sustained, be they more or less. ”

“ Public justice must, therefore, be defeated, as all will agree, if the error cannot be corrected that the prisoner would be entitled to a discharge on habeas corpus, as every sentence in a criminal case is an entirety, so that if any part of it is unauthorized by law the whole sentence is illegal. ”

“ So, in the same act, a person, who, having knowledge of the commission of murder, or other felony, on the high seas, or within any fort, arsenal, dock-yard, magazine, or other place, or district of country within the sole and exclusive jurisdiction of the United States, shall conceal the same, &c. he shall be adjudged guilty of misprision of felony, and shall be adjudged to be imprisoned, &c. It is clear, that congress cannot punish felonies generally; and, of consequence, cannot punish misprision of felony. ”

“ Errors even in the administration of criminal law will occur, and the ends of justice imperatively require that when they do occur there shall be some appropriate mode for their correction without discharging a prisoner legally convicted, as it cannot be admitted that an error of the court in passing the sentence of the law can have the effect to expiate the offence of the prisoner or to condone the criminal act of the offender. ”

“ The procedure in penal cases including the administration of punishment, in civil cases and in matters of voluntary jurisdiction, is to be simplified and expedited, by eliminating all dispensable measures and by utilizing all available manpower, as far as it is compatible with the purpose of the procedure. In particular, in penal cases the enforcement of the indictment by the offended party, and the formal decree of the court opening, the trial will be eliminated; the authority of the local court in penal matters is to be enlarged, and the admissibility of writs of punishment to be extended. ”

“ An offense cognizable in any court is cognizable in that court. If the offense be punishable by law, that court is competent to inflict the punishment. The judgment of such a tribunal has all the obligation which the judgment of any tribunal can have. To determine whether the offense charged in the indictment be legally punishable or not, is among the most unquestionable of its powers and duties. The decision of this question is the exercise of jurisdiction, whether the judgment be for or against the prisoner. ”

“ If a person shall, in violation of the act of Congress, knowingly and willingly obstruct, or hinder the claimant in seizing the fugitive, he cannot, when sued for the penalty of five hundred dollars prescribed by the act, set up as a defence ignorance of the law, or even an honest belief that the person claimed as a fugitive did not owe service to the claimant. Such matters are unfit for the inquiry of the jury. ”

“ If a state adopts the policy of imposing heavier punishment for repeated offending, there is manifest propriety in guarding against the escape from this penalty of those whose previous conviction was not suitably made known to the court at the time of their trial. ”

“ For the point of punishment, an indictment will lie at the king’s suit, against the false imprisoner, grounded on this statute, for the vindication of the public justice of the nation; and the party, if found guilty, shall be punished by fine and imprisonment. For the relief of the person injured, he may have an action of false imprisonment, wherein he shall recover damages; or an action on the case grounded on this statute, wherein he shall have the same remedy. ”

“ If there is nothing before the court which the prisoner, in the language of the constitution, can be 'held to answer,' he is then entitled to be discharged so far as the offense originally presented to the court by the indictment is concerned. The power of the court to proceed to try the prisoner is as much arrested as if the indictment had been dismissed or a nolle prosequi had been entered. ”

“ Production before the trial is not, perhaps, contemplated by the words of the provision, nor is it in general necessary, as the penalty, in case of failure to comply with the order, is not arrest and imprisonment until the party comply, as for a contempt, but a judgment of nonsuit or default, as the plaintiff or defendant is the offending party. ”

“ The short of it is that the policy of vesting sentencing authority primarily in juries — a decision largely motivated by the desire to mitigate the harshness of the law and to bring community judgment to bear on the sentence as well as guilt or innocence — has so effectively achieved its aims that capital punishment within the confines of the statutes now before us has, for all practical purposes, run its course. ”

“ The Government's whole argument rests on the stark premise that Congress has left to the district attorney or the Attorney General the power to say whether the judge and jury must punish identical conduct as a felony or as a misdemeanor.
A basic principle of our criminal law is that the Government only prosecutes people for crimes under statutes passed by Congress which fairly and clearly define the conduct made criminal and the punishment which can be administered. ”

“ In the instant case we are dealing with a statute that invokes punishment as for a felony where the same conduct, if committed in a non-labor dispute, would be a misdemeanor—an offense as to which the guilty party might be discharged upon payment of a small fine, as compared with a possible two-year prison term. ”

“ But when he is sentenced to perpetual imprisonment or to death, the appellate court shall send the inculpatory evidence and the decree to the assessory court. If the assessory court deems the decree of the appellate court, sentencing the culprit to perpetual imprisonment or to death, to be proper, only then shall the decree be executed. And we retain with the chancery courts matters of malfeasance by civic offices, as well as of owners' incomes from cities, and all others stipulated by the laws of the Commonwealth. ”

“ He shall not be permitted to set up the real or supposed offences of others to justify his own wrong.
Here, the defendants having, by a gross abuse of their official authority, confined the plaintiff in a State prison among convicts for many months, not that he might be prosecuted for a public offence, but for the avowed purpose of coercing the payment of money, they ought not to be permitted to set up, either in mitigation of actual or exemplary damages, that the plaintiff was guilty of an offence for which the law had prescribed another and different punishment. ”

“ Those courts have expressed their belief that, even where the punishment imposed upon a defendant is entirely within the limits prescribed for the crime of which he was convicted, a sentence imposed in a prohibited manner-as, for example, a sentence imposed upon an absent defendant in violation of the command of Rule 43 that a defendant be present at sentencing [3] -is an 'illegal sentence' subject to correction under Rule 35. ”

“ Provided, That all persons may elect to sue for the penalties aforesaid, or to proceed under their rights at common law and by State statutes; and having so elected to proceed in the one mode or the other, their right to proceed in the other jurisdiction shall be barred: But this provision shall not apply to criminal proceedings, either under this act or the criminal law of any State: and provided further, That a judgment for the penalty in favor of the party aggrieved, or a judgment upon an indictment, shall be a bar to either prosecution respectively. ”

“ We do not overlook the point that there must be jurisdiction to give the judgment rendered, as well as to hear and determine the cause. If a magistrate having authority to fine for assault and battery should sentence the offender to be imprisoned in the penitentiary, or to suffer the punishment prescribed for homicide, his judgment would be as much a nullity as if the preliminary jurisdiction to hear and determine had not existed. Every act of a court beyond its jurisdiction is void. ”

“ Rule 35 applies to any 'illegal sentence,' not to any illegal conviction, and thus by its terms the Rule protects only those rights which a defendant retains even if the judgment of guilt against him is proper. ”

“ Such reasonable suspicion of guilt as justifies a grand jury in finding a bill of indictment is sufficient in the one case, but such positive proof as would require the court to enter up judgment and award execution is absolutely necessary in the other. The government demanding a fugitive from justice seeks possession of him for a trial, before a court and jury, of the question of criminality; but the claimant of an alleged fugitive from service seeks possession of him to avoid a trial, before a court and jury, of the question of freedom. ”

“ If without subscribing to it they ventured to do the duties which belonged to their respective callings, they were liable to a fine of five hundred dollars or to imprisonment in the county jail for not less than six months, or to both; if they should take the oath falsely they would be adjudged guilty of perjury, and punished by imprisonment in the penitentiary for not less than two years. As was inevitable, arrests and indictments for the violation of this statute were frequent. Its attempted enforcement outraged and angered the people. ”

“ But no court may properly release a prisoner under conviction and sentence of another court, unless for want of jurisdiction of the cause or person, or for some other matter rendering its proceedings void. Where a court has jurisdiction, mere errors which have been committed in the course of the proceedings cannot be corrected upon a writ of habeas corpus, which may not, in this manner, usurp the functions of a writ of error. ”

“ We have no doubt they possess no such power. An indictment upon which a prisoner can be held to answer must be found by a grand jury impanelled and sworn in pursuance of law, and before a court of competent jurisdiction. ”

“ Thus, murdering two people simultaneously might well warrant two punishments but stealing two one-dollar bills might not. (b) Two statutes or two portions of a single statute proscribe certain conduct, and the question is whether the defendant can be punished twice because his conduct violates both proscriptions. Thus, selling liquor on a Sunday might warrant two punishments for violating a prohibition law and a blue law, but feloniously entering a bank and robbing a bank, though violative of two statutes, might warrant but a single punishment. ”

“ When a human life is at stake and when the jury must have information prejudicial to the question of guilt but relevant to the question of penalty in order to impose a rational sentence, a [p. 192] system is more likely to ensure elimination of the constitutional deficiencies identified in Furman. [41]
But the provision of relevant information under fair procedural rules is not alone sufficient to guarantee that the information will be properly used in the imposition of punishment, especially if sentencing is performed by a jury. ”

“ Much complaint is made that persons are often discharged from arrest and imprisonment when their conviction, upon which such imprisonment was ordered, is perfectly correct; the excess of jurisdiction on the part of the court being in enlarging the punishment, or in enforcing it in a different mode or place than that provided by the law. ”

“ But the ex post facto clause looks to the standard of punishment prescribed by a statute, rather than to the sentence actually imposed. The Constitution forbids the application of any new punitive measure to a crime already consummated, to the detriment or material disadvantage of the wrongdoer. ”

“ By the law of England, informations by the attorney general, without the intervention of a grand jury, were not allowed for capital crimes, nor for any felony, by which was understood any offense which at common law occasioned a total forfeiture of the offender's lands or goods, or both. ”

“ Suppose the sentence of a court-martial is such a judgment as will support such defence, when the second indictment is for the same offence and for a violation of the laws of the same sovereignty, will the record of a sentence by a court-martial of the United States support the plea of a former conviction, where the second indictment is found for an offence committed in violation of a State law? ”