Case ID: ala-app_16/html/0416-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "BROWN, P. J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

(78 South. 410)
    BICE v. STATE.
    (3 Div. 294.)
    (Court of Appeals of Alabama.
    April 2, 1918.)
    Criminal Law <&wkey;252(3) — Complaint—Sufficiency.
    A complaint charging that X B. did in the opinion of complainant commit on him the offense assault and battery with a deadly weapon, knucks, was wholly insufficient to sustain a judgment of conviction, or further proceedings against defendant.
    Appeal from. Circuit Court, Autauga County; Gaston Gunter, Judge.
    Jack Bice was prosecuted for assault and battery with a deadly weapon, and appeals from the conviction.
    Reversed and rendered.
    C. E. O. Timmerman, of Prattville, for appellant. F. Loyd Tate, Atty. Gen., and David W. W. Fuller, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
   BROWN, P. J.

The only complaint appearing in the record to sustain the judgment of conviction, omitting the caption, signature, and jurat of the officer, is in these words:

“Before me, W. A. Rawlinson, N. P. and Ex-Offi. J. P., a justice of the peace in and for said county, personally appeared Paul A. Tatum, who being duly sworn, deposes and says, on oath, that in said county on or about 3d day of February, 1917, one Jack Bice did in Ms opinion commit on him the offense assault and battery with a deadly weapon, knucks, against the peace and dignity of the state of Alabama.”

This is wholly insufficient to sustain the judgment of conviction, or further proceedings against the defendant. Butler v. State, 130 Ala. 127, 30 South. 338; Sherrod v. State, 34 Ala. App. 57, 71 South. 76.

The judgment appealed from is reversed, and one here rendered discharging the defendant.

Reversed and rendered.