Court Opinion

ID: 9864363
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 12:53:55.058832+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:10:33.880347
License: Public Domain

Robins, J. (concurring). I concur in the result reached, but not in the reasons given by the majority. In the first place, in my opinion, the lower court correctly held that the evidence adduced was not sufficient to show that a felony had been committed. Furthermore, the only question presented by the state’s appeal is the sufficiency of the evidence, and we have heretofore laid down the rule that we would not entertain such an appeal. State v. Smith, 94 Ark. 368, 126 S. W. 1057; State v. Spear and Boyce, 123 Ark. 449, 185 S. W. 788; State v. Gray, 160 Ark. 580, 255 S. W. 304; State v. Massey, 194 Ark. 439, 107 S. W. 2d 527; State v. Dixon, 209 Ark. 155, 189 S. W. 2d 787. But I do not agree that a motion for a new trial by the state was a prerequisite for an appeal such as this. Appeals by the state from judgments of the lower court are not governed by the procedure in other cases. Such an appeal is a special statutory proceeding authorized by §§ 4253 and 4254, Pope’s Digest, nob for the purpose of awarding a new trial to the state, but for the purpose of obtaining from this court a declaration of law, on the controverted question, that may be a precedent in future trials. The statute does not enjoin the filing of such a motion, and despite some previous declarations of this court, I do not think such motion should be required. Neither the circuit court nor this court can ever grant a new trial in a criminal case, where the punishment may be imprisonment and the accused is acquitted by a jury. In such a case the defendant has been put in jeopardy by the first trial, no matter how erroneously conducted by the judge; and a subsequent trial would violate the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy. The provisions of our statute authorizing appeals by the state (§§ 4253 and 4254, Pope’s Digest) seem to have been borrowed almost literally from the Kentucky code. The Kentucky Court of Appeals, in the case of Commonwealth v. Williams, 230 Ky. 71, 18 S. W. 2d 881, construing these provisions of the Kentucky code, said: “In felony cases ... in which appeals are allowed for certification of the law no motion . . . for a new trial is required.” Since there could be no new trial in a case of this kind, the state ought not, in order to appeal, be required to ask for a new trial. The law ought never require the doing of a vain and useless act. I am authorized to state that Mr. Justice Millwee concurs in the views above expressed.