Case Name: State of Louisiana vs. Thomas Arata
Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1880-02
Citations: 32 La. Ann. 193
Docket Number: No. 7534
Parties: State of Louisiana vs. Thomas Arata.
Judges: 
Reporter: Louisiana Annual Reports
Volume: 32
Pages: 193–195

Head Matter:
No. 7534.
State of Louisiana vs. Thomas Arata.
Whether or not the panel from which were drawn tlie jurors who tried the defendant was selected by a quorum of the jury commissioners, is a question of fact of which this court has not jurisdiction.
It is sufficient if the panel of jurors was drawn by two of the three who compose the board of jury commissioners.
A member of the Board of Health who accepts the office of jury commissioner, and qualifies as such, thereby ceases to be a member of the Board of Health, and may thereafter perform the duties of a jury commissioner.
APPEAL from the Superior Criminal Court, parish of Orleans. Whitaker, J.
H. N. Ogden, Attorney-General, for the State.
H. C. Castellanos and Arthur Gastinel for defendant and appellant.
No brief filed on the part of the State.
Henry 0. Castellanos and Arthur Gastinel, fqr the defendant, contended :
First — That the question of whether the panel was drawn by a quorum of jury commissioners is a pure and exclusive question of law which this court has a right to pass on. 14 A. 461; 13 A. 46 ; 12 A. 679 ; 10 A. 271; 4 A. 505 ; 20 A. 442 ; 29 A. 824.
Second — The second point, embodied in our challenge to the array, was that one of the jury commissioners, which is an office of profit and trust, was discharging at the time, under appointment of the Governor, another office of trust and of profit, to wit: that of member of the Board of Health, in violation of the 117th article of our State Constitution.

Opinion:
The opinion of the court was delivered by
DeBlanc, J.
Thomas Arata was indicted and tried for manslaughter, found guilty and sentenced to imprisonment at hard labor for the term of five years, and to pay a fine of five dollars and the costs of the -prosecution.
He appealed; his case was submitted without argument, and his counsel allowed — to file a brief in his behalf — the delay which he asked. That delay has elapsed, and the promised brief has not been filed.
We have carefully examined the record, and ascertained that Arata's .defence is based on two grounds, the first of which is " that the panel from which was drawn the jurors called to pass upon his trial, was not selected by a quorum of the commissioners " — this is a question of fact- and the other " that one of the three commissioners was a member oí the Board of Health, and could not — at the same time — hold two offices of profit and trust."
Admitting that the regularity of an officer's appointment can be collaterally inquired into — upon which, in this instance, it is useless to express any opinion — the second ground, to which alone our jurisdiction extends, cannot — for a self-evident reason — avail defendant. That reason is that two of the three members who compose the board of jury commissioners, did select the panel, and the statute expressly provides that. " the acts of two of them shall be as valid and binding as if performed by all."
Act No. 24 of 1878, sect. 2, p. 281.
It is, therefore, ordered, adjudged and decreed that the judgment-appealed from is affirmed.