Title: State v. Howell

State: arizona

Issuer: Arizona Supreme Court

Document:

107 Ariz. 300 (1971) 486 P.2d 782 STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Anthony Wayne HOWELL, Appellant. No. 2327. Supreme Court of Arizona, In Banc. June 29, 1971. *301 Gary K. Nelson, Atty. Gen., Phoenix, for appellee. Ross P. Lee, Phoenix, for appellant. STRUCKMEYER, Chief Justice. In this criminal appeal, Anthony Wayne Howell was informed against in the Superior Court of Maricopa County, Arizona, for robbery, Count 1, and assault with a deadly weapon, Count 2, to which charges he pleaded not guilty. Robbery is punishable by imprisonment for not less than five years. A.R.S. § 13-643. On November 19, 1970, the State filed an amended information for grand theft from the person, a felony, accompanied by a stipulation in these words: The stipulation was signed by the defendant, by the public defender and a deputy county attorney. To the amended charge, defendant entered a plea of guilty. He was sentenced on the sixth day of January 1971 to imprisonment for not less than six nor more than eight years to date from the time of his arrest, August 1970. Thereafter, the defendant filed a notice of appeal directed to the Court of Appeals, Division One, State of Arizona, appealing from the judgment and sentence pronounced upon him. On May 28, 1971, the Clerk of the Court of Appeals, being of the opinion that because the original information charging robbery carried a possible sentence of life imprisonment and because if defendant obtained a reversal, upon return to the Superior Court the former information might be reinstated, whereupon the criminal action would involve crimes over which the Court of Appeals has no jurisdiction, caused the record to be transmitted to the Clerk of this Court, where it was docketed as Criminal Cause 2327. The jurisdiction and venue of the Court of Appeals is provided by A.R.S. § 12-120.21. Subsection A reads: Jurisdiction depends upon the state of affairs existing at the time it is invoked, Gardner v. Gardner, 253 S.C. 296, 170 S.E.2d 372, and once having attached is not lost by subsequent events. Atlantic Corporation v. United States, 1 Cir., 311 F.2d 907. Under the Arizona enactment A.R.S. § 12-120.21, jurisdiction is dependent upon the punishment which is to be imposed under the charge. The Clerk of this Court is ordered to transmit to the Clerk of the Court of Appeals, *302 Division One, the record in this cause, with directions that it be entered upon the files of that court for disposition according to law. HAYS, V.C.J., and UDALL and LOCKWOOD, JJ., concur. CAMERON, Justice (dissenting). Unlike the Superior Court and the Supreme Court, both of which are constitutional courts, the Court of Appeals under our Constitution (Art. 6, § 1), A.R.S. is a creation of the legislature, A.R.S. § 12-120, et seq., and has only such jurisdiction as the legislature in its wisdom provides. Two statutes are pertinent in this regard: And: The Court of Appeals, Division One, in discussing its jurisdiction early in the operation of that court stated: The court in that case went on to discuss the meaning of the word "punishable": The Court of Appeals later took the position that where a person is charged with burglary in the first degree, a crime which is not punishable by life imprisonment, but wherein a charge of a prior conviction enhances that to a possible life imprisonment, that if the allegation of prior conviction is dropped then the Court of Appeals would have jurisdiction over the particular crime as charged and under which the defendant was sentenced. This court stated in that situation: *303 In the instant case, the crime charged in the information and to which the defendant entered his original plea was punishable by life imprisonment. Should the matter be reversed on appeal, he has agreed that he could be tried for the crime as originally charged unless by the action of this court in vesting jurisdiction on the Court of Appeals we are stating that this is not a crime involving life imprisonment and the agreement may not be enforced upon remand. When the legislature intended to exclude from the Court of Appeals "criminal actions involving crimes punishable by death or life imprisonment" it was interested in the severity of the crime as charged, and not the crime as compromised, or the sentence imposed. I do not believe under the Constitution we are able to confer upon the Court of Appeals jurisdiction it does not have in its legislative grant of authority. I believe this court should retain jurisdiction.