Court Opinion

ID: 9824629
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 11:01:30.768034+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:39:54.803409
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing.
The application for rehearing on behalf of the state is predicated principally upon the following insistence in brief of the Attorney General, towit: “Conceding that this cause was correctly reversed by the Court of Appeals because of the insufficiency of the evidence to show a sale of prohibited liquors, it is earnestly insisted by the' appellee that such cause should have been remanded for a new trial rather than rendered, because in this case, as stated, the jury could have found defendant guilty of an attempt to sell prohibited liquors. Code Section 3307, Code of Alabama of 1923, gives the jury the right to find the defendant guilty of an attempt to commit an offense charged in the indictment, without any special count in the indictment for such attempt.”
The foregoing insistence pretermits the most salient provision of the statute referred to and relied upon.
Section 3307 provides, upon the trial of an indictment for any offense, the jury may find the accused not guilty of the offense charged in the indictment, but, if the evidence warrants it, guilty of an attempt to commit such an offense, without any special count in the indictment for such attempt. (Italics ours.)
This court, or any other court, is without authority to extend the provisions of the foregoing statute. The statute says what it means, and means what it says. It limits its operation to trial upon indictment, and there is no provision for its application to prosecutions based, as here, upon an affidavit or complaint. Moreover, as stated, a salient provision of said statute which would justify the jury when finding the accused not guilty of the offense charged in the indictment, but could find him guilty of an attempt to commit such offense is only if and when the evidence warrants it. In this case, we reiterate there was no evidence adduced upon the trial of this case upon which a verdict of guilty of the offense charged could be rested. We also now hold that there was no evidence on the trial of this case to warrant the jury in returning a verdict of guilty of an attempt to commit such offense.
We adhere to the order of this court as formerly entered and adjudged.
Application for rehearing overruled.
After Remandment.
The criticism and discussion in our original opinion in this case as to the insufficiency of the affidavit is hereby modified to conform to the decision of the Supreme Court in Campbell v. State, Ala.Sup., 191 So. 812,1 and the order here “rendering” a judgment discharging appellant from further custody in this proceeding is hereby withdrawn and held for naught, in line with the holding of the Supreme Court, supra.
We adhere to our original opinion wherein it was held that the court erred in refusing to give the affirmative charge requested by the defendant. The discussion on this proposition in the original opinion is reiterated and, results that the judgment of conviction from which this appeal was taken is reversed and the cause remanded.
Reversed and remanded.'

 238 Ala. 439.