The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1889-03-08
Judge McDermott Argues
That There Is No Legal
Indictment Against
FTeeholder Hen
nessey.
WINFIELD'S ADMISSIONS.
The Whole Array May Be Set
Aside by the
Court.

Allan L. McDermott had his whole law
library behind him when he rose to argue,
in Judge Lippincott's Court this morning
that there is no Indictment against Free
holder Hennessey because there is no
Grand Jury topresent one.
Prosecutor Winfield had fortified him
self, to argue the other way, only with the
minutes of the Court of Oyer and Termi-
ner"
Ex-Judge McDerInott presented his
argument with cogent clearness, and
when he had finished it, Mr.. Winfield
more than half threw up the sponge to
him.
The line of Mr.. McDermott's argument
was this:
Before the Jury Commission was created
the Sheriffs had selected the Grand and
petty juries After having picked out the
twenty-four men who were to serve the
Court at grand inquests, he certified the
fact of his selection to the Court, and then
made return to the Court that the gentle
men who offered themselves at the open
ing of the term to be sworn were the gem
tlemen whom he had chosen for that
function, in pursuance OF the forms OF
law.
r I'll
took from the Sheriff the duty of selecting
the grand jurors That is, they were en-
powered by law only to pick out the names
of the twenty-four good men and true.
Their function ended with the selection of
the names. The duty of producing the
men named in court was with the Sheriff
as before.
The commissioners list when made up
was certified to the Sheriff, whose duty it
became to summon the persons named;
and the Sheriff should, at the opening OF
the term, have made return to the court
that the twenty-four who presented them
selves to be sworn as grand jurors We're
the twenty-four who had been selected by
the jury Commissioners.
NO RETURN MADE.
At the opening of the September term
Sheriff Davis thus identified the grand
Jurors to the court, but at the opening of
the last December term he failed to make
the return.
Mr.. McDermott urged that the omission
of this return was SO fatal an omission in
the summoning of the Grand Jury that
there is no legally constituted Grand jury
in the county.
'There is nothing y said Mr.. McDermott,
''but the similarity between the names of
those selected by the Jury Commissioners
and of those who were sworn as grand
jurors to show that the persons whom the
commissioners selected were the persons
who appeared in court. No record of the
court shows who brought them here or
how they got here"
''Or why they got here?" Prosecutor
Winfield interiected.
''No," Mr. McDermott continued, ''nor
why they didn't go home after they had
got here"
The learned counsel argued that, since
challenges were forbidden after the grand
jurors had been sworn, it became the
duty of the Court to guard with Jealous
care the technical requirements of the law
i'll the summoning of the grand jurors,
and quoted authorities in support of his
proposition that the array had been fre-
quently set aside because of Very much
less serious omissions than that noted in
this case.
MR. wINFIELD's ARGUMENT.
ssAll I can say" Mr. Winfield rejoined,
when he argued in behalf of the Grand
Jury, sis that the same names are on the
list stspplied by the Jury Commissioners
to the County Clerk, and on the list GER
titled to the Sheriff, of those selected for
Grand jury service, and on the minutes
showing who were sworn at the opening
of the Court.
"There is hiatus here, / admit, y he
added apologetically "We can't say that
the John Smith summoned by the Sheriff
and sworn by the Court, is the John Smith
who was selected by the Jury Commits
sion to serve, because the Sheriff has
made no return to the Court to that
effect. All can do is to lay the facts be-
fore the Court"
Judge Lippincott, after the argument,
said that decision will be reserved for a
week.
'.Dickn Garrick, one of the clerks in
Sheriff Davis office, was asked how it was
: that the Sheriff omitted to make the proper
return.
sWell,n said he, II asked Jury Com
missioner Reed about making the return,
and he said he would attend to it and that
we need not look after it,