Case Name: The State against Mitchell
Court: South Carolina Court of Common Pleas
Jurisdiction: South Carolina
Decision Date: 1792-09
Citations: 1 Bay 267
Docket Number: 
Parties: The State against Mitchell.
Judges: 
Reporter: South Carolina Law Reports
Volume: 1
Pages: 267–269

Head Matter:
The State against Mitchell.
IN this case affidavits were submitted to the court, on behalf of one Heyliger, against Col. Mitchell, one of the justices of the peace for Charleston district; and an information was moved for against him, for oppression in office as a magistrate.
Pinckney, on behalf of the defendant,
opposed the motion, on the ground that the 2d section of the 3d article of the new constitution of the state, had virtually abolished this species of public prosecution ; and that the law with regard to it had been entirely changed, and that in future, all prosecutions must be carried on in the name, and by the authority of the state of South-Carolina, must conclude against the peace and dignity of the same. That therefore, every case of a public nature, must come before the court through the medium of a grand jury, by indict» merit, and not be left to the discretion of the court.
AH public, prosecutions, hr the LJii section of the 3d article of the new constitution, are to be carried on ,by indictment, through the medium of a grand jury consequently, the proceed* ing by way of information is abolished in Smtth-CuroU-nu.
The counsel for the prosecution, concurred in this construction, and the court were of the same opinion.
On the day following, however, the witnesses, whose affidavits had been submitted to the court, on the motion, being made for the information, were sent to the grand jury then sitting; upon which a presentment was made against the said Mitchell, ufor oppression in office as a ma-° “ gistraie, and recommending to the legislature that he should “ be struck offi the commission of the peace, as unvmrthy of upublic trust.”
After the presentment had been handed into court, Pinck-ney and Pringle moved that it should be quashed, on se» vcral grounds, viz.
1. That no specific charge of oppression was set forth in the presentment, upon which the attorney-general could frame a bill, or against which the defendant could defend himself.
2. That the names of the witnesses were not set forth, in order that the defendant might know against whom to bring his action, in case the presentment should prove to be malicious.
3. That it would operate as a sentence against a public officer, without giving him an opportunity of being heard in his defence ; when it was probable, that upon a trial he might be honourably acquitted.
4. That as the grand jury had requested their presentment to be published in the gazettes, and this among others, it would be holding out to the world, a man who had been in the confidence of the public, as unworthy of further trust, without being heard ; which, in effect, would be fixing a public stigma upon him, without a trial, in every part of the world where the papers should go, before the real merits of the case could be known.
"Where a presentment of a grand jury a-$>’ainsl a pub-lie officer is general, without specifying the offence and the witnesses* names on whose information it is founded, the court will quash it. Q Hawk. 25S, Hamard. 140, 4 Mach. Oil.

Opinion:
The Court,
after hearing counsel on both sides, ordered, that that part of the presentments of the grand jury, which affected the defendant, Mitchell, and recommended him to be dismissed from his office as a magistrate, be quashed ; and their other presentments to be published agreeable to their request; on the grounds that the charge was too general, and not sufficiently specific ; that the names of the witnesses were not set forth, and that it operated as a condemnation without trial, which was against Magna Charta, and the liberties of a citizen.
A bill of indictment was afterwards found against him by the same grand jury, for falsely and arbitrarily imprisoning Heyliger for one night in the guard-house in Charleston, under colour of his office. He was accordingly tried at the same term, upon the indictment, and acquitted of the charge..