Opinion ID: 299374
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: subpoena for daisy wilson

Text: 38 This case went to trial on August 10, 1970, after all attorneys had announced ready for trial, and it was concluded on August 19. Late on August 18, the attorney for Tocco advised the trial court that on Saturday, August 15, he had a conference with Daisy Wilson, grandmother of Willie Neal, and that he wanted her as a defense witness; that she had advised him she would be available to testify on Monday, August 17, but that when he tried to serve her on Monday, it was learned she had left for Mississippi on Sunday. He asked the court for a recess in the trial until Mrs. Wilson could be subpoenaed in Mississippi, which the court denied. He further advised the court 39 that in matters of his nature I try to keep a supply of subpoenas available just in the event a witness may turn up, as this one has. I have been informed on numerous occasions by the Clerk of this District, and as recently as this afternoon my associate was informed by the Clerk of this District that he is not authorized to issue subpoenas signed and sealed unless the names of the witnesses are included in the subpoena. In other words, he is not authorized, and has been directed not to issue subpoenas in blank. 40 Had I been able to obtain subpoenas in blank prior to the commencement of this trial, I would have had one available to serve on Mrs. Wilson at the time she was in my office. Unfortunately, I didn't have one, so I have no executed subpoena on which to enforce the process. 41 The attorney did not advise the court that he had requested any subpoenas in blank for this case prior to or during this trial, but merely advised the court that they had been refused in the past; there is no other evidence in the record as to whether or not a blank subpoena was requested and refused in this case. 42 Rule 17 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure provides for the issuance of subpoenas signed and sealed but otherwise in blank to a party requesting it    and if the attorney had made such a request in this case and was refused, the trial court could then have directed the clerk to issue the blank subpoena. But where there is no evidence of such a request in this case, and where the attorney for the defendant, after announcing ready for trial, waited until the next to the last day of the trial to request a delay, it was not an abuse of discretion to deny the request. As stated in United States v. Bolton, 438 F.2d 1219, 1220 (5th Cir. 1971), 43 [t]he granting of a continuance until an absent witness can be procured is, of course, within the sound discretion of the district court, and it is not error to deny a requested continuance in the absence of a showing of an abuse of that discretion. United States v. Pierce, 5th Cir. 1969, 411 F.2d 678; Barnes v. United States, 5th Cir. 1967, 374 F.2d 126; Samples v. United States, 5th Cir. 1941, 121 F.2d 263. Accord, Powell v. United States, 420 F.2d 799, 801 (9th Cir. 1969); Evalt v. United States, 382 F.2d 424, 427 (9th Cir. 1967). See also Cummings v. United States, 398 F.2d 377, 379 (8th Cir. 1968); Hemphill v. United States, 392 F.2d 45, 49 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 393 U.S. 877, 89 S.Ct. 176, 21 L.Ed.2d 149 (1968). Cf. Bandy v. United States, 296 F.2d 882 (8th Cir. 1961), cert. denied, 369 U.S. 831, 82 S.Ct. 849, 7 L.Ed.2d 796 (1962).