Case ID: miss_2/html/0024-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Chief Justice Sharkey", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Beall v. Campbell.
    A verdict of a jury, without a showing in the record that the jury were “ sworn” and that an issue was submitted to them, is erroneous, and the judgment will be reversed.
    ERROR to the Circuit Court of Yazoo county.
    This was a motion in the Circuit Court of Yazoo county by the present defendant against the plaintiff in error, as sheriff of said county, founded on the return to a “fieri facias” in favor of the defendant Campbell against the goods and chattels of Joseph Clark, and Elias G. Myers, and upon which the money was made by the said sheriff or his deputy. In bar of the motion the sheriff filed two pleas of payment, to which there were replications and an issue to the country. From the record it appears that, subsequently to filing the pleas, “ an issue being made up in this case it was ordered that a jury come, whereupon came a jury, to wit, R. Bowman, &c., who say upon their oaths, that they find for the plaintiff, and assess his damages to one hundred and thirty seven dollars and twenty-eight cents,” upon which finding the court rendered judgment.
    Howard and Fitch, for plaintiff in error.
    Perkins, contra.
    
   Mr. Chief Justice Sharkey

delivered the opinion of the court.

This cause comes into this court by writ of error, and the errors assigned, are. 1st. That there appears to be a verdict of a jury without a showing in the record that the jury was sworn. 3d. That it does not appear that the jury were sworn to try. These two points being fully sustained by the record, are good grounds for reversing the judgment, and it is, therefore, unnecessary to decide on the others. The record does not show that the jury was em-pannelled, sworn, or that the issue was submitted to them for trial.

It is obvious that it was necessary in the first place, that the jury should have been regularly sworn and empannelled. It was equally necessary that the issue should have been submitted to them for their finding. If these be essential requisites, then it follows that they must be complied with, and it should so appear on the record.

The judgment must be reversed and a new trial granted.