New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1870-09-18
FIRST DISTRICT COURT.


| We have a peculiar institution IN this
city, called the First District Court. It's
| personnel is, by no means, an obnoxious or
| disagreeable one in fact, it would be to
the liking OF every good citizen, so far as
j0nhommie and other agreeable qualities
are concerned. 1t has an able and benev-
olent judge, al astute and ever subtle
District Attorney, popular but not re-
| nominated Sheriff, and gentlemanly and
courteous clerk. But, somehow or another,
it is not much Of terror to evil-doers.
Last summer nearly twenty prisoners,
some under commitment, some under in
dictment and others under conviction, in
Guiding some who had been convicted
second time, were set free in consequence
Of the statutes Of the Hon. John Ray, of
Ouachita. It was held that these statutes,
in simultaneously repeating and re-enact-
ing the criminal laws, worked q hiatus
amounting to an absolution from crime pre-
viously committed. The REPUBLICAN, as a
sentinel on the watch tower Of public
order and liberty, sounded the alarm.
The eyes of the public were awakened to
the public danger, and the Supreme Court
promptly corrected and arrested, so far
as it was possible, the consequences of the
heretical and eccentric ideas which had
somehow crept into the First District
Court.
That the Court, after this adnlonition,
should again fall into opinions remarkable
for their novelty and entire foreignness to
the criminal law, one would hope would
not be the case. But on Friday morning
last the Court after due expounding Of
the law, as interpreted by the Hon. ex-
Senator Rufus King Cutler, held that a
party accused for crime committed in the
City of Jefferson, before annexation, must
60 free and can not be held for trial be-
cause of the annexation aforesaid. Jeffer-
son City was in the parish Of JEFF
ferson, and is now in the parish of Or
leans; therefore all crimes committed
and upon which no convictions We're had
before annexation, must go UNPUBLISHED.
Upon this theory, all the financial frauds
and rascalty which were perpetrated in
Jefferson City just before the turning over
are absolved. A neat way is thus present.
ed of showing the criminally disposed how
they can commit few burglaries and
murders the night before a pending an
neZation of part Of one parish to another
An Indictment must show the time and
place OF committing crime, and the
fact that it was then in another parish is
neither here nor there. That goes to the
question of jurisdiction, and it is sufi-
Gent if at the time of trial, the place is
within the jurisdiction of the court try
ing the case. Even if the court itself did
not exist when the crime was committed,
it would nevertheless have jurisdiction.
The case has arisen where ever there has
been an annexation, a conquest, or
the erection Of a new State or
form Of government. 1t is the same in
} the case Of a new parish or county formed.
The books do not tell, and nobody ever
| heard Of criminal escaping upon such
| grounds. He could not except that it
was at time anterior to the existence of
the present tribunal, or even anterior to
the existence of the parish itself. The
only inquiry is, "Did the law defining
and furnishing the crime exist at the time
OF Its commitment Every man in
the City of Jefferson is amenable to the
proper tribunal Of this parish if he CON-