Court Opinion

ID: 9883667
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-06 02:08:45.640015+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:48:28.597577
License: Public Domain

*275
Eldridge, J.,

dissenting:

In my view, the proper venue where a defendant is charged with the crime of escape is the jurisdiction where the escape actually took place. Where a timely objection to venue is made, the statute does not permit trial in a different county because of the location of the institution in which the defendant was previously confined. Therefore, I would reverse petitioner’s conviction of escape.
Art. 27, § 139, provides in pertinent part (emphasis supplied):
“If any offender or person legally detained and confined in the penitentiary or jail, or house of correction, or reformatory, or station house, or any other place of confinement, in this State, shall escape he shall be guilty of a felony and on conviction thereof by the Criminal Court of Baltimore City or by the circuit court of the county in which the escape takes place, be sentenced to confinement . . . for such additional period, not exceeding ten years, as the court may adjudge.”
The majority opinion purports to recognize the principle, which this Court has reiterated on numerous occasions, that “a statute should be construed according to the ordinary and natural import of the language used, unless a different meaning is clearly indicated by its context, without resorting to subtle or forced interpretations for the purpose of extending or limiting its operation.” Balto. County v. White, 235 Md. 212, 218, 201 A. 2d 358 (1964); Dundalk Liquor Co. v. Tawes, 197 Md. 446, 454-455, 79 A. 2d 525 (1951); Barrett v. Clark, 189 Md. 116, 123, 54 A. 2d 128, 173 A.L.R. 988 (1947); Schmeizl v. Schmeizl, 186 Md. 371, 375, 46 A. 2d 619 (1946). See also Grosvenor v. Supervisor of Assess., 271 Md. 232, 237-238, 315 A. 2d 758 (1974); Radio Communications, Inc. v. Public Service Commission, 271 Md. 82, 93, 314 A. 2d 118 (1974); Chillum-Adelphi Volunteer Fire Dept., Inc. v. Prince George’s County, 269 Md. 486, 491, 307 A. 2d 481 (1973); Scoville Service, Inc. v. Comptroller of *276the Treasury, 269 Md. 390, 395, 306 A. 2d 534 (1973); Giant of Maryland, Inc. v. State’s Attorney for Prince George’s County, 267 Md. 501, 511-512, 298 A. 2d 427, appeal dismissed, 412 U. S. 915, 93 S. Ct. 2733, 37 L.Ed.2d 141 (1973); Germenko v. Pub. Service Comm., 226 Md. 295, 301-302, 173 A. 2d 362 (1961).
Applying this principle of statutory construction to the subject case, the ordinary and natural import of the language used dictates that a prosecution for escape be only in the jurisdiction where the actual escape takes place. An escape occurs when there is a “departure or deliverance out of custody,” Black’s Law Dictionary (Rev. 4th ed. 1968), 639, and in the present case such event concededly occurred in Baltimore City. Art. 27, § 139, specifies that the defendant shall be guilty of escape if convicted by “the circuit court of the county in which the escape takes place . . . .” The statutory language is clear and unambiguous in specifying one and only one court for the trial of escape cases, namely that of the jurisdiction where the “escape” occurs. To construe the statute, as did the Court of Special Appeals, to permit trial in either the county where the escape takes place or the county where the correctional institution in which the defendant had previously been confined is located, would be, in the language of the above-cited cases, “resorting to subtle or forced interpretations for the purpose of extending . . . [the statute’s] operation.”
The holding of the majority and of the Court of Special Appeals, that venue for escape may lie “in the county of the penal institution from which the constructive departure occurs” (21 Md. App. at 353), could present serious problems with regard to ascertaining the county of “constructive departure.” Since 1967 in Maryland, convicted persons have not been sentenced to correctional institutions as was formerly the practice. Instead, all sentences are to the jurisdiction of the Division of Correction of the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, and all such sentenced persons “shall be committed to the custody of the Commissioner of Correction.” Code (1957, 1971 Repl. Vol., 1974 Cum. Supp.), Art. 27, § 690 (b). See also Code (1957, *2771971 Repl. Vol.), Art. 41, § 204D (a). The Commissioner of Correction may confine them in “institutions,” county or Baltimore City detention facilities, correctional camps, community correction centers, other “facilities” under his jurisdiction, State Police barracks, or, in the case of illness, “to a place where adequate treatment for the illness of the prisoner may be maintained.” Art. 27, §§ 689, 690, 698. Moreover, under Art. 27, § 700E, the Commissioner of Correction need not keep inmates, sentenced to his jurisdiction for certain specified crimes, in “actual confinement,” but he may grant them the privilege of living in a “noninstitutional environment” including living at home. In light of the fact that sentences are not to designated institutions, and considering the flexibility which the Commissioner of Correction has in regard to places of confinement, or even places of “non-confinement,” the concept of “constructive custody” in the “institution” to which a person had been confined is just not a practical one for determining venue in' escape cases. Under the existing statutory scheme, for escape purposes there is little or no rational basis for distinguishing between “institutions” and other places where a person may be held in custody by the Commissioner of Correction. A convicted person, sentenced to the custody of the Commissioner of Correction, may never be “confined” in what has traditionally been regarded as an institution.
The majority opinion discusses in detail the cases in this Court dealing with what constitutes the crime of escape under Art. 27, § 139, states that the “question of venue . . . was certainly obliquely before this Court” in two of the cases, and further states that, as a result of those decisions, “a certain ‘gloss’ has been placed upon” § 139. The cases are: Slagle v. State, 243 Md. 435, 221 A. 2d 641 (1966); Ford v. State, 237 Md. 266, 205 A. 2d 809 (1965); Best v. Warden, 235 Md. 633, 201 A. 2d 490 (1964); Taylor v. State, 229 Md. 128, 182 A. 2d 52 (1962); and Johnson v. Warden, 196 Md. 672, 75 A. 2d 843 (1950). However, in none of these cases was the issue of the proper venue presented or considered. Since it is well settled that any question concerning venue is waived if *278not timely raised, I do not understand how the issue of venue was before the Court in any of the prior cases, even “obliquely.” This Court, in the above-cited cases, was not construing the phrase in Art. 27, § 139, delineating the proper venue for trial of the crime of escape. Instead, the Court was construing the language in the statute which comes before the venue provision, setting forth the substantive crime of “escape.”
Moreover, assuming arguendo that the prior cases in this Court concerning Art. 27, § 139, were instructive on the matter of venue, they would support the position that venue for the crime of escape under § 139 lies in the county where the escape actually takes place and not in the county where the penal institution is located. In Best v. Warden, supra, 235 Md. at 634, and presumably in Johnson v. Warden, supra,1 the penal institution and the place from which the actual escape took place were in the same county; so no question of venue pertinent here could have been raised. In all of the remaining cases, where it appears that the penal institution was in one jurisdiction and the escape in another, the trial for the crime of escape took place in the jurisdiction where the escape actually occurred. Thus, in Slagle v. State, supra, 243 Md. 435, the inmate was confined in the Baltimore City jail awaiting trial; he was sent to the Clifton T. Perkins Hospital in Howard County for an examination; and, like the petitioner in the instant case, he escaped from the hospital. His trial for the crime of escape was in Howard County, where the hospital was located, instead of in Baltimore City where the penal institution where he had been confined was located. In Ford v. State, supra, 237 Md. 266, the appellant was confined in the Maryland Correctional Institution in Washington County; he was brought to the Baltimore City courthouse by a guard from the Maryland Correctional Institution; at the courthouse he *279asked the guard if he could go get a drink of water; and after he was granted permission and his handcuffs were removed, he escaped. The trial on the escape charge was in Baltimore City, where the escape occurred, and not in Washington County where the penal institution was located. In Taylor v. State, supra, 229 Md. 128, the inmate was confined in the House of Correction in Anne Arundel County, and was later transferred to a “Correctional Camp” at Sandy Point, also in Anne Arundel County. He was then placed on a work detail at University Hospital in Baltimore City, and, like petitioner Brenda Stewart, escaped from University Hospital. The prosecution of Taylor for escape was in Baltimore City, where University Hospital is situated, and not in Anne Arundel County where both the House of Correction and the Sandy Point Correctional Camp were situated. Consequently, if the issue of venue were “obliquely before this Court” in any of our prior cases, one would have to draw the conclusion that, under our cases, the appropriate jurisdiction for trial of the crime of escape is the jurisdiction where the escape actually takes place.
Cases in other jurisdictions under constitutional or statutory venue provisions like Art. 27, § 139, have reached the same result as I would here. In State v. Dignan, 114 W. Va. 275, 171 S. E. 527 (1933), a convict was temporarily assigned to a road gang in Braxton County, West Virginia, from which he escaped. However, he was tried for escape in a different county, where the state penitentiary was located. In light of the provision of the West Virginia Constitution that trials for such crimes shall be held in the “county where the alleged offense was committed,” the Supreme Court of West Virginia reversed the conviction, rejecting the argument “that a convict can be constructively in the penitentiary for the purposes of venue of a criminal offense without being physically present in . . . [such] county.” 171 S. E. at 528. The Supreme Court of Mississippi under similar facts and a similar constitutional provision reached the same result in Rice v. State, 192 So. 2d 698 (Miss. 1966).2
*280On the other hand, the cases which have reached the same result as does the majority in the instant case, have all involved statutory provisions which specified that venue in escape cases would lie in more than one county, or have arisen where there were no constitutional or statutory provisions bearing on the question. Thus in People v. Vanderburg, 67 Cal. App. 217, 227 P. 621 (1924), the statute provided “that a charge of escaping from a prison may be tried in any county of the state.” In People v. Richards, 247 Mich. 608, 226 N. W. 651, 652 (1929) and People v. Thomas, 1 Mich. App. 118, 134 N.W.2d 352, 357-358 (1965), the statute provided that one charged with an escape “shall be charged with said offense and tried in the courts of the county wherein the administrative offices of the prison may be,” regardless of where the escape took place. See also Cutter v. Buchanan, 286 S.W.2d 902, 903 (Ky. 1956), and Clark v. Commonwealth, 293 S.W.2d 465 (Ky. 1956), cert. denied, 353 U. S. 923, 77 S. Ct. 682, 1 L.Ed.2d 720 (1957) (involving a Kentucky statute expressly permitting trial in both places); State v. Hutcheson, 251 Or. 589, 447 P. 2d 92 (1968) (involving an Oregon statutory scheme which decreed that custody should remain with a specified institution); Sweden v. State, 83 Okl. Cr. 1, 172 P. 2d 432 (1946) (no pertinent constitutional or statutory provisions involved). The cases from other jurisdictions cited by the majority, namely State v. Mead, 130 Conn. 106, 32 A. 2d 273 (1943); State v. Rardon, 221 Ind. 154, 46 N.E.2d 605 (1943); State v. Baker, 355 Mo. 1048, 199 S.W.2d 393 (1947); Ex Parte Rody, 348 Mo. 1, 152 S.W.2d 657 (1941), did not involve questions concerning appropriate venue.
The plain language of Art. 27, § 139, requires that venue for the crime of escape be only where the actual escape takes place. Therefore I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Special Appeals.
*281Judges Smith and Digges authorize me to state that they concur in the views expressed herein.

. In Johnson, the inmate was confined in an institution located in Washington County; the institution officials assigned him to work on a farm; and he escaped from the farm. While the reported opinion does not specify the county in which the farm was located, it is reasonable to assume that institution officials in Washington County would choose nearby farms for the assignment of their inmates.

. The majority opinion states that the petitioner’s reliance on Dignan and Rice is misplaced because Maryland, in light of the holding in Kisner v *280State, 209 Md. 524, 122 A. 2d 102 (1956), does not have a constitutional provision like West Virginia’s and Mississippi’s. While'-Maryland may not have a constitutional provision specifying the venue for criminal offenses like this, we do have a statutory provision specifying that the proper jurisdiction for the trial of escape cases is the “county in which the escape takes place,” Art. 27, § 139. i