Court Opinion

ID: 9681886
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 08:00:27.800866+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:36.348619
License: Public Domain

MORRISON, Judge
(Dissenting).
This is the first case to reach this court since I have been a member thereof in which a prisoner has been discharged under the rule in the Erwin case, and I cannot bring myself to agree with the rule therein enunciated. I agree with that portion of the majority opinion in which it is reiterated that one who has served the minimum term is entitled to discharge if the maximum term is in excess of the punishment authorized by law.
I think this court was wrong in Daugherty v. State, 146 Tex. Cr. Rep. 303, 174 S. W. 2d 493, when it declined to follow the Bailey case.
In Bailey v. U. S., 74 Fed. 2d 451, the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit had before it practically the identical question as is here presented. There the court said:
“It is our opinion that Congress did not use the phrase ‘term of years’ in the technical sense attributable to it when applied to estate in lands. Life being of limited duration and death *238being certain, a sentence for life is definite and certain. It is tantamount to a sentence for a definite term of years greater than the possible life span of the person sentenced.”
This case was followed by the Circuit Court for the Ninth Circuit in Bates v. Johnson, 111 Fed. 2d 966, and in the later case of Carter v. Johnson, 145 Fed. 2d 882.
I respectfully enter my dissent.