Case ID: ohio-cc-ns_2/html/0622-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

JURIES IMPANNELED UNDER. WRONG LAW.
    [Circuit Court of Franklin County.]
    George T. Barlow v. The State of Ohio.
    Decided, February 15, 1904.
    
      Criminal Law — Jury Law of September, 1902 — Not Applicable to Offenses Committed Prior to That Date.
    
    One indicted for an offense committed prior to September 30, 1902, can not be tried before a petit jury impanneled, and under an indictment returned by a grand jury impanneled under the act of September 30, 1902, providing for the appointment of a jury commission for the selection of jurors.
    Sullivan, J.; Summers, J., and Wilson, J., concur.
   The plaintiff in error was indicted for embezzlement April 23, 1902. October 22 the grand jury returned another indictment for the same offense.

January 3, 1903, the first indictment was nollied and plaintiff was put upon trial in the court below on second indictment March 9, 1903. He was found guilty as charged in the indictment. A motion for new trial was filed, which was overruled, and he was sentenced to the penitentiary for the period of one year.

On the day set for trial (March 9, 1903) the accused filed a challenge to the array on the ground that the crime with which he was charged was alleged to have been committed on the 19th of February, 1902, and that on the — day of February, 1902, prosecution for the offense was commenced against him in police court of the city of Columbus, and on March 5, 1902, he was bound over to appear before the grand jury, and that he had ever since the date above named been in the custody of the court.

S. Hamberton, for plaintiff in error.

Taylor & Seymour, for defendant in error.

That on September 30, 1902, the jury law that was then in force when said alleged crime was committed was repealed by an act of the General Assembly, and an amended jury law was enacted for the appointment of a jury commission and the selection of jurors, which repealed the former jury law that existed at the time said alleged crime was committed.

That the grand jury drawn and impanneled returned the indictment in the case, and the petit jury selected and called to try the accused were each so selected, drawn and called under the act of September 30, 1902, in violation of the rights and liberty of the accused.

The facts stated in this motion were conceded to be true, except as to the rights and liberty of the. accused being violated thereby. The motion was overruled, and the accused put upon trial, to which action of the court the accused at the time excepted, and his exception was entered upon the record. The overruling of this motion is alleged as one of the grounds of error in the petition in error, and also set forth in the motion for a new trial.

The court erred in overruling this motion and the accused was prejudiced thereby. Bach v. State, 38 Ohio State, 664.

There are no other errors prejudicial to plaintiff in error apparent upon the record, and for the error alone stated it follows that the- judgment must be reversed and cause remanded to be proceeded in according to law.