Summary conviction

“ Of course, where the judge makes a final determination that a confession is admissible and sends it to the jury as a part of the evidence to be considered on the issue of guilt and the ruling admitting the confession is found on review to be erroneous, the conviction, at least normally, should fall with the confession.
But here the confessions are put before the jury only tentatively, subject to its judgment as to voluntariness and with binding instructions that they be rejected and ignored unless found beyond reasonable doubt to have been voluntary. ”

“ But a person accused of crime has a twofold protection-in the court and the jury-against being unlawfully convicted. If the evidence appears to the court to be insufficient in law to warrant a conviction, the court may direct an acquittal. ”

“ If a conviction take place, whether an indictment be good or otherwise, it is ten to one that judgment passes; for, if he read the bill, it is not probable he will have penetration enough to discern its defects. ”

“ Yet the evil influence of the reversal of a conviction on appeal, however much it is to be deprecated, is as nothing compared with a deliberate acquittal of a guilty defendant by a reckless, sentimental, or lawless jury. Few can appreciate as does a prosecutor the actual, practical and immediate effect of such a spectacle upon those who witness it. ”

“ Whilst, therefore, we doubt whether, on well-established principle or policy, even a conviction of perjury is, per se, sufficient cause for a new trial or review, we cannot doubt that imputed perjury, without conviction, is not sufficient in any case. ”

“ It is an essential corollary of our reasonable-doubt standard in criminal proceedings that a conviction, capital or otherwise, cannot stand if the jury's verdict could have rested on unconstitutional grounds. ”

“ Even to be acquitted may damage one's good name if the community receives the verdict with a wink and chooses to remember defendant as one who ought to have been convicted. A conviction, on the other hand, may be accepted as a misfortune or an injustice, and even enhance the standing of one who mends his ways and lives it down. ”

“ If the jury is contumacious, if, whilst they confess their entire conviction of the truth of the fact charged in the indictment, they deny the legal doctrine and acquit the prisoner, the Court is without redress. They may bully and look big—there is no help. ”

“ The wretch stained with crime—polluted with iniquity—for which, perhaps, the statute-book contains neither name nor indictment—whose trembling lips are eager to avow that guilt which, by confessing, he hopes may alleviate the penalty—this man, I say, is checked in his intentions—he is warned not, by any chance expression, to hazard a conviction of his crime, and told in the language of the law not to criminate himself. ”

“ To warrant a conviction upon a charge of murder, the evidence must be of such kind and quantity as to convince the jury of the truth of the charge beyond every reasonable doubt, and to a moral certainty. If, therefore, when you, without passion, prejudice, or bias, have fairly and honestly considered the entire evidence on both sides of the case, do not feel morally certain, to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt, of the guilt of the defendants, then it is your duty to acquit them. ”

“ It is as much a denial of due process to sustain a conviction merely because a verdict of guilty might have been rendered on a valid ground as it is to send an accused to prison following conviction of a charge on which he was never tried. ”

“ It is the duty of the district-attorney to endeavor to secure a conviction—it would be his duty to consent to a plea—when fully convinced in his own mind of the accused person’s legal guilt. But when he is doubtful, or at least not entirely satisfied, of that guilt, as I confess to being in the case at bar, it is his duty to submit the question for arbitration to a jury. That, your honor, is the stand which I am compelled to take in these premises. I entertain grave doubts of the prisoner’s guilt—doubts which could only be set at rest by a verdict rendered in the regular way. ”

“ Of course, some prosecutors are so anxious to convict that they will wheedle or deceive a judge into giving charges which are not only most inimical to the prisoner, but so utterly unsound that a reversal is sure to follow; but when one of these professional bloodhounds is baying upon the trail all he thinks of is a conviction—that is all he wants, all the public will remember ”

“ See App. 51-54. Since the general verdict does not disclose which of these findings-only one of which can constitutionally entail conviction-was the actual finding, the conviction must of course be reversed. ”

“ A conviction of a felony or a misdemeanor involving moral turpitude implies the absence of qualities which fit one for an office of trust, where the rights and property of others are concerned. The record of conviction is conclusive evidence on this point. Such conviction, as already said, can follow only a regular trial upon the presentment or indictment of a grand jury. It cannot follow from any proceeding of the court on a motion to disbar, for the reason already given, that no one can be required to answer for such an offence except in one way. ”

“ Appellant contends that the word 'conviction' relates to the verdict of the jury, and not to the sentence of the court, and that, therefore, the governor had no power to grant the reprieve, nor subsequently to issue the warrant of execution. ”

“ Even the exception to this practice of including the fact of a prior conviction in the indictment and trying it to the jury helps to prove the rule that that fact is an element because it increases the punishment by law. ”

“ The other man he quarrelled with has to give evidence against him; whole families come down to the court and swear against each other till they become bitter enemies. If there is a conviction the man who is convicted never forgives. ”

“ If the facts which would be laid before them, should produce in their minds a conviction of the guilt of the prisoners, he was sure that they would, without hesitation, pronounce a verdict which would consign some, if not all of them, to a certain, speedy, and ignominious death; and he was equally sure, that if an opposite conviction was the result of the evidence, the jury would at once acquit the prisoners at the bar. ”

“ If we were reviewing only the sufficiency of the evidence to support the verdict on Count 1, that conviction would be sustained. There was, as the Court of Appeals recognized, ample evidence in addition to presence at the still to support the charge of possession of an illegal still. ”

“ The need for corroboration extends beyond complete and conscious admission of guilt-a strict confession. [7] Facts admitted that are immaterial as to guilt or innocence need no discussion. But statements of the accused out of court that show essential elements of the crime, here payment of money, necessary to supplement an otherwise inadequate basis for a verdict of conviction, stand differently. ”

“ But where a conviction for a less crime cannot be had under an indictment for a greater which includes it, there it is plain that while an acquittal would not or might not be a bar, a conviction of the greater crime would involve the lesser also, and would be a bar ”

“ There is no comparable hazard when the indictment or information is in several counts and the conviction is explicitly declared to rest on findings of guilt on certain of those counts, [9] for in such instances there is positive evidence that the trier of fact considered each count on its own merits and separately from the others.
We turn to considering whether appellant's words could have been the sole cause of his conviction, or whether the conviction could have been based on both his words and his burning of the flag. ”

“ No case has been found in which, after a conviction and sentence, remaining unreversed, on some of the counts in an indictment, a second sentence, upon a subsequent trial and conviction on another count in the same indictment, has been affirmed by a court of error. ”

“ If the confession which petitioner made in the District Attorney's office was in fact involuntary, the conviction cannot stand, even though the evidence apart from that confession might have been sufficient to sustain the jury's verdict. ”

“ Although the term has been served, the results of the conviction may persist. Subsequent convictions may carry heavier penalties, civil rights may be affected. [27] As the power to remedy an invalid sentence exists, we think, respondent is entitled to an opportunity to attempt to show that this conviction was invalid. ”

“ It might not be safe, however, to repose this high trust in a bare majority. The object to be attained is, on the one hand, to make the number authorized to convict so large, as to afford a reasonable assurance that there will be no conviction without clear proof of guilt, and, on the other, to make it so small, as to afford equal assurance that the guilty will not escape. ”

“ In forming this conviction we are not limited merely to the rules of evidence, which, by the experience of ages, have been found best adapted to the trial of offenses in the double tribunal of court and jury, but we may seek light from history, from personal knowledge, and from all sources that will tend to form a conscientious conviction of the truth. And we are not bound to technical definitions of crimes and misdemeanors. ”

“ Exceptions of the kind have their foundation in necessity, as all experience shows that errors and casualties will sometimes intervene in the administration of criminal justice. Autrefois acquit or autrefois convict, where the indictment is valid and the conviction is regular, in a court of competent jurisdiction, is a bar to a second prosecution for the same offence, but even that rule is subject to all the exceptions named and to many others of like character. ”

“ My duty here is to help fashion rules which will assure that every person charged with an offense receives a fair and impartial trial. But that obligation does not require my ferreting out of the record technical grounds for reversing a particular conviction, grounds which could not possibly have affected the jury's verdict of guilt as a factual determination. ”

“ Many of your jurors may have a strong suspicion, at least, that the verdict should be in some respects different from that which is actually returned. When no verdict has been given in, the public are aware that there was a difference of opinion amongst the jury; but when they do deliver a verdict, it cannot be concluded, in every case, that there was even ultimately an unanimity. We think it better that every man should be left free, after having heard the opinions of others, and consulted with them, to declare what was his own ultimate conviction. ”

“ And yet, that is as much as the Testimony of another Wizzard, who only by the Devil's help reveals the Witch.
XII. If a man, being dangerously sick, and like to dye, [Pg 32] upon Suspicion, will take it on his Death, that such a one hath bewitched him, it is an Allegation of the same nature, which may move the Judge to examine the Party, but it is of no moment for Conviction.
XIII. Among the sufficient means of Conviction, the first is, the free and voluntary Confession of the Crime, made by the party suspected and accused, after Examination. ”

“ The decision to plead guilty is a decision to allow a judgment of conviction to be entered without a hearing-a decision which is irrevocable and which forecloses any possibility of establishing innocence. If we assume that petitioner committed a crime, we cannot know the degree of prejudice which the denial of counsel caused. ”

“ Due process, moreover, is a guarantee that a man should be tried and convicted only in accordance with valid laws of the land. If a conviction is not valid under these laws, statutory and constitutional, a man has been denied due process and has a constitutional right to have the conviction set aside, without being deprived of life, liberty, or property as a result. ”

“ The record of both the original trial and the proceedings on the motions for a new trial shows clearly that the trial judge gave the numerous elements of the controversy careful and honest consideration. We think that even a casual perusal of this record should have revealed to the Circuit Court of Appeals that here nothing more was involved than an effort to upset a trial court's findings of fact.
Determination of guilt or innocence as a result of a fair trial, and prompt enforcement of sentences in the event of conviction, are objectives of criminal law. ”

“ After a person, protected by the presumption of innocence, has been convicted by a state trial court and his conviction has been subjected either to direct or collateral attacks in the state courts, [5] wise administration commands that this Court be asked, by appeal or certiorari, to pass upon the federal constitutional questions presented. [6] It is only by such a procedure that the validity of state criminal conviction can be expeditiously and finally adjudicated. ”

“ Even if the paraphernalia of justice,—the judge, and the jury, and the lawyers, could be induced to declare her innocent before all men, must she not confess her guilt to him,—to that one,—for whose verdict alone she cared? ”

“ The court said: 'A conviction or acquittal upon one indictment is no bar to a subsequent conviction and sentence upon another, unless the evidence required to support a conviction upon one of them would have been sufficient to warrant a conviction upon the other. The test is not whether the defendant has already been tried for the same act, but whether he has been put in jeopardy for the same offense. A single act may be an offense against two statutes ”

“ In fact, I would be far more troubled about constitutionality should either a State or the Federal Government declare that a jury in trying a defendant charged with crime is compelled to accept without question a trial court's factual finding that a confession was voluntarily given. Whatever might be a judge's view of the voluntariness of a confession, the jury in passing on a defendant's guilt or innocence is, in my judgment, entitled to hear and determine voluntariness of a confession along with other factual issues on which its verdict must rest. ”