Opinion ID: 2274864
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Approver

Text: Calhoun has seized upon Code (1957) Art. 27, § 635 which states: No conviction or attainder shall work corruption of blood or forfeiture of estate; the estate of such persons as shall destroy their own lives shall descend or vest as in case of natural death; if any person be killed by casualty there shall be no forfeiture in consequence thereof; and approver shall never be admitted in any case whatsoever, and a sentence of death shall not be executed in less than twenty days after judgment. (emphasis added). With the exception of the fact that the section originally began with the word that, no change has been made in the statute since its original enactment by Ch. 138, § 10 of the Acts of 1809. That chapter extensively revised the criminal law of Maryland. By Calhoun's express direction, it is contended that this provision placed an affirmative obligation on the trial court to bar the testimony of the accomplice Smallwood. The ancient practice of approver is explained in 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries []329: But there is another species of confession which we read much of in our ancient books, of a far more complicated kind, which is called approvement. And that is when a person indicted of treason or felony, and arraigned for the same, doth confess the fact before plea pleaded, and appeals or accuses others, his accomplices, in the same crime in order to obtain his pardon. In this case he is called an approver or prover, probator, and the party appealed or accused is called the appellee. Such approvement can only be in capital offences; and it is, as it were, equivalent to an indictment, since the appellee is equally called upon to answer it: and if he hath no reasonable and legal exceptions to make to the person of the approver, which indeed are very numerous, he must put himself upon his trial, either by battle or by the country, and if vanquished or found guilty must suffer the judgment of the law, and the approver shall have his pardon ex debito justitiae. On the other hand, if the appellee be conqueror or acquitted by the jury, the approver shall receive judgment to be hanged, upon his own confession of the indictment; for the condition of his pardon has failed, viz: the conviction of some other person, and therefore his conviction remains absolute. But it is purely in the discretion of the court to permit the approver thus to appeal or not; and, in fact, this course of admitting approvements hath been long disused; for the truth was, as Sir Matthew Hale observes, that more mischief hath arisen to good men by these kind of approvements, upon false and malicious accusations of desperate villains, than benefit to the public by the discovery and conviction of real offenders. And therefore, in the times when such appeals were more frequently admitted, great strictness and nicety were held therein; though since their discontinuance the doctrine of approvements is become a matter of more curiosity than use. I shall only observe that all the good, whatever it be, that can be expected from this method of approvement is fully provided for in the cases of coining, robbery, burglary, house-breaking, horse-stealing, and larceny to the value of five shillings, from shops, warehouses, stables, and coach-houses, by statutes 4 & 5 W. and M. c. 8, 6 & 7 W. III. c. 17, 10 & 11 W. III. c. 23, and 5 Anne, c. 31, which enact that if any such offender, being out of prison, shall discover two or more persons who have committed the like offences, so as they may be convicted thereof, he shall, in case of burglary or house-breaking, receive a reward of 40 l., and in general be entitled to a pardon of all capital offences excepting only murder and treason; and of them also in the case of coining. And if any such person, having feloniously stolen any lead, iron, or other metal, shall discover and convict two offenders of having illegally bought or received the same, he shall, by virtue of statute 29 Geo. II. c. 30, be pardoned for all such felonies committed before such discovery. It hath also been usual for the justices of the peace, by whom any persons charged with felony are committed to gaol, to admit some one of their accomplices to become a witness (or, as it is generally termed, king's evidence) against his fellows; upon an implied confidence, which the judges of gaol-delivery have usually countenanced and adopted, that if such accomplice makes a full and complete discovery of that and of all other felonies to which he is examined by the magistrate, and afterwards gives his evidence without prevarication or fraud, he shall not himself be prosecuted for that or any other previous offence of the same degree. Id. []329-31 (emphasis in original). See also 1 J. Bishop, New Criminal Procedure, §§ 1156-1163 (1895). In Whiskey Cases, 99 U.S. 594, 25 L.Ed. 399 (1879), the Supreme Court explained somewhat relative to approvers: Speaking upon that subject, Lord Mansfield said, more than a century ago, that there were three ways in the law and practice of that country in which an accomplice could be entitled to a pardon: First, in the case of approvement, which, as he stated, then still remained a part of the common law, though he admitted it had grown into disuse by long discontinuance. Secondly, by discovering two or more offenders, as required in the two acts of Parliament to which he referred. Thirdly, persons embraced in some royal proclamation, as authorized by an act of Parliament, to which he added, that in all these cases the court will bail the prisoner in order to give him an opportunity to apply for a pardon.  Approvers, as well as those who disclosed two or more accomplices in guilt and those who came within the promise of a royal proclamation, were entitled to a pardon; and the same high authority states that besides those ancient statutory regulations there was another practice in respect to accomplices who were admitted as witnesses in criminal prosecutions against their associates, which he explains as follows: Where the accomplice has made a full and fair confession of the whole truth and is admitted as a witness for the crown, the practice is, if he act fairly and openly and discover the whole truth, though he is not entitled of right to a pardon, yet the usage, the lenity, and the practice of the court is to stop the prosecution against the accomplice, the understanding being that he has an equitable title to a recommendation for the king's mercy. Subsequent remarks of the court in that opinion showed that the ancient statutes referred to were wholly inapplicable to the case, and that there remained even at that date only the equitable practice which gives a title to recommendation to the mercy of the crown. Explanations then follow which prove that the practice referred to was adopted in substitution for the ancient doctrine of approvement, modified and modelled so as to be received with greater favor. As modified it gives, as the court said in that case, a kind of hope to the accomplice that if he behaves fairly and discloses the whole truth, he may, by a recommendation to mercy, save himself from punishment and secure a pardon, which shows to a demonstration that the protection, if any, to be given to the accomplice rests on the described usage and his own good behavior; for if he acts in bad faith, or fails to testify fully and fairly, he may still be prosecuted as if he had never been admitted as a witness. Rex v. Rudd, 1 Cowp. 331; s.c. 1 Leach, 115. Great inconvenience arose from the practice of approvement, in consequence of which a mode of proceeding was adopted in analogy to that law, by which an accomplice may be entitled to a recommendation to mercy but not to a pardon as of legal right, nor can he plead it in bar or avail himself of it on his trial. 2 Hawk. P.C. n. 3, p. 532; 3 Russ. on Crimes (9th Am. ed.), 596. 99 U.S. at 599-600 (emphasis in original). In Byrd v. Commonwealth, 4 Va. (2 Va. Cases) 490 (1826), the court stated: It is a mistake to suppose that the competency of accomplices depends on, or grew out of, the doctrine of approvement. An approver is one who being indicted for treason, or felony, and arraigned, confesses the fact before he pleads, and accuses others, his accomplices, in order to obtain his pardon. His approvement is equivalent to an Indictment, and if he supports it in all respects, and the person accused by him is found guilty, the approver is entitled to his pardon, but if he is acquitted, the approver receives judgment to be hanged, upon his own confession of the Indictment. 4 Bl. Com. 329; Rudd's Case, 1 Leach, 115. An accomplice, who voluntarily gives his evidence, is not exonerated from punishment, nor entitled to a pardon, if he succeeds in convicting a fellow prisoner, nor is he subjected to punishment in consequence of his failure. In both cases, his acquittal, or his conviction, depends on the evidence to be adduced on his own trial. His competency depends on the ancient principle of the Common Law, before averted to, that no person is to be excluded from giving evidence on account of infamy, unless he has been convicted of an infamous crime. 4 Va. (2 Va. Cases) at 493 (emphasis in original). In Commonwealth v. Dabney, 40 Va. (1 Rob.) 696, 706 (1842), the court referred to a legislative enactment stating that `approvers shall never be admitted in any case whatsoever,' stating that the legislature had thus manifested its disapprobation of holding out impunity [sic] to an accomplice, as an inducement to him to become a witness against his associates. The opinion concluded by stating, [A]n accomplice has no right to demand such a recommendation, merely because he has given evidence on the part of the commonwealth, fully, candidly and impartially. Id. at 708. The Court of Special Appeals has had a similar issue before it in Oliver v. State, 53 Md. App. 490, 500-03, 454 A.2d 856 (1983). The statute in question merely made it plain that the practice of approvement would not be permitted in this State. It is not authority for holding that the testimony of an accomplice is not admissible against those with whom he was associated in a criminal act.