Case ID: ala_135/html/0069-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "TYSON, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Marks v. The State.
    
      Proceeding to amend Judgment mine pro tunc.
    
    1. Amendment of judgment nunc pro tunc; when properly allowed. Where the clerk of a court in entering a judgment of conviction upon the minutes of the court omits therefrom a formal adjudication by the court of the guilt of the defendant, and the entries by the judge on the trial docket show a finding of the defendant guilty and the assessment of a fine, such judgment may be amended nunc pro tunc at a subsequent term of the court, so as to make it contain a formal adjudication of the defendant’s guilt.
    Appeal from the City Court of Bessemer.
    Tried before the Hon. B. C. Jones.
    The appellant in this case was tried and convicted for an assault and battery. The cause was tried by the court without the intervention of jury.
    The entries on the trial docket, by the judge, as shown by 1ns bench notes, show a finding by him of the defendant guilty of the. offense charged, the assessment of a fine, and the confession of judgment by the defendant and other perons as his sureties. In entering up> the judgment, upon the. minutes of the court the clerk did not enter therein a formal adjudication by the court of the guilt of the defendant. At the next term of the court the solicitor of said court made a motion to amend the judgment nunc pro tunc entered in the said cause as made at the former term so as to make it contain the formal adjudication of the defendant’s guilt. The defendant and his sureties in the confession of judgment objected to 'the granting of such motion upon the ground that the matter proposed to be amended nunc pro tunc was not a judgment, and, therefore, constituted nothing to be amended, and, further, because said judgment at the former term of the court had passed beyond the jurisdiction of the court. This objection was overruled, and the court granted said motion amending the judgment 
      nunc pro tunc. To this ruling the defendant duly excepted, and from said judgment amending the former judgment nunc pro tunc the present appeal is prosecuted.
    Trotter & Odell, for appellant.
    The object of a judgment nunc pro tunc, or, an' amendment of a judgment nunc pro tunc, is not to correct judicial errors, such as to render a judgment which the court ought to have rendered, in the place of one which it did erroneously render, nor to supply non-action by the court. Wilmerding v. Corbin Banking Co.. 126 Ala. 288; Dumas v. Hunter, 30 Ala. 188; Broioder v. Faulkner, 82 Ala. 257; Robertson v. King, 120 Ala. 459. Amendments of judgment can not cure the inaction, or an erroneous action of the court. — Taylor v. Harwell, 65 Ala. 1.
    Charles G. Brown, Attorney-General, for the State.
    The bench notes, or entries of judgment on the trial docket, were sufficient record evidence upon which to amend the judgment, nunc pro tunc, or to enter upon the minutes of the court the judgment of conviction. This entry of judgment on the record was the duty of the clerk of the court and his failure to do so was merely clerical error. The court did not err in ordering the judgment to be entered on the record at a subsequent term of the court under the doctrine laid down in the following cases: Clanton v. State, 96 Ala. Ill; Charles v. State, 4 Porter 107; Kuehlthau v. State, 92 Ala. 92; Herring v. Cherry, Smith & Co., 75 Ala. 376.
   TYSON, J.

The only matter of omission from the original minute entry was the formal adjudication by the court of the guilt of the defendant. The entries by the judge, as shown by his bench notes, show a finding of guilt by him, the assessment of a fine of five dollars and a confession of judgment by defendant and certain persons as his sureties, etc., etc. The entry thereof upon the minutes of the court was a mere clerical duty of the clerk, guided and directed by these entries, covering and determining the issues committed to the trial judge for decision. “These entries and the law, in other words, show what the judgment should .have been and-what the court must be presumed to have intended it should be;, and it becomes the clerk’s duty to enter on the record such judgment as the law required should be entered, upon the finding of issues in the case, in the manner evidenced by these bench notes. * * This clerical duty having been omitted at the term of the court at which it should have been discharged, there can be no doubt of the court’s power to order the entry of record to be made at a subsequent term; the law and the evidence furnishing the data necessary to the 'exercise of the power.’’—Kuehlthau v. The State, 92 Ala. 91. See also May v. Hassell, 4 Stew. & Port. 222.

Affirmed.