Ex Parte J. L. Cox

187 S.W.2d 985, 148 Tex. Crim. 432, 1945 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 758
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedApril 25, 1945
DocketNo. 23107.
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 187 S.W.2d 985 (Ex Parte J. L. Cox) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ex Parte J. L. Cox, 187 S.W.2d 985, 148 Tex. Crim. 432, 1945 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 758 (Tex. 1945).

Opinions

HAWKINS, Presiding Judge.

*434 On June 5, 1940, relator entered his plea of guilty in the Criminal District Court of Dallas County in three cases charging him with passing a forged instrument. Judgments of conviction were entered and sentences were pronounced the samé date, the sentence in each case made to begin on said June 5, 1940. The sentences in the three cases mentioned, therefore, ran concurrently. Notwithstanding his pleas of guilty relator appealed all three of his cases to the Court of Criminal Appeals and was released from custody pending appeal upon executing appeal bonds or recognizances in the three cases. On December 4, 1940, the Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the judgments in two of the cases, and dismissed the appeal in the other one. Mandates were issued in each of the three, cases on December 20, 1940, directing the trial court to execute the judgments of the Court of Criminal Appeals. Relator did not appear in response to his appeal bonds and they were forfeited. On January 5, 1942, the Clerk of the Criminal District Court of Dallas County issued a capias in each of the cases mentioned and placed same in the hands of the sheriff of Dallas County, coim manding him, — and we here quoté:

* * to take the body of James Lleldon Cox and him safely keep, so that you have him before the. Honorable Criminal DiSr trict Court of Dallas County, Texas, at the court, house thereof in the City of Dallas, instanter, then and there to answer, the State of Texas in a charge by indictment, wherein said James Lleldon Cox is charged with the offense of forgery and passing forged instrument. * * *”

The capiases were not executed until the 22d day of August, 1942, and then under the circumstances hereafter stated. On May 23, 1942, while relator was still at large after the three State cases had been disposed of in the Court of Criminal Appeals a complaint was filed before the United States Commissioner at Dallas charging him with violation of the Selective Service Act. The capias issued under it was returned not executed. Later however, in August, 1942, and prior to the 22d of said month relator was apprehended in Salt Lake City, Utah, and was returned to Dallas on a Federal Court removal order on August 22, 1942. His bond to await the action of the Federal Grand Jury was fixed at $5,000.00. He could have made such bond and been released but for the three State cases against him. The capiases in said three cases which had been issued on January 5, 1942, were returned by the sheriff of Dallas County as “executed this 22d day of August, A. D. 1942, by arresting the within named defendant in the Dallas County Jail.” In September, 1942, the Federal Grand Jury indicted relator, and on *435 September 23, 1942, he plead guilty in the Federal Court and was given three years in the United States Penitentiary at' Leavenworth, Kansas. The sentence in the Federal Court was not made cumulative to those in the State court. Immediately after his sentence in the Federal Court on September 23, 1942, relator was taken by the United States Marshal to the Federal Penitentiary at Leavenworth, Kansas, and was confined there until January 13, 1945, having fully served said three year Federal sentence, less the “good time” he was credited with. On said January 13, 1945, the Federal officers at the Leavenworth Penitentiary delivered relator to the Sheriff of Dallas County, who immediately transferred him to the county jail of that county where he was confined until January 28, 1945, at which time he was delivered to the agent of the Texas State Penitentiary under and by virtue of three commitments, and was taken to said penitentiary and has been confined there since such date.

At the time relator was brought back from Utah by the Federal authorities both Federal and State prisoners were lodged in the Dallas County Jail. The Sheriff of Dallas County at the time involved had a contract with the Federal Government by which he had charge of Federal prisoners. They were kept in the same jail with the State prisoners, and were cared for, fed and furnished bedding, for which services the Federal Government paid the Sheriff of Dallas County.

The Honorable Winter King certifies his conclusion from the facts that after the capiases were served on relator on August 22, 1942, the Sheriff was holding him as a joint prisoner of the United States and the State of Texas.

On February 1, 1945, relator obtained from the Hon. Winter King, Judge of the Criminal District Court of Dallas County, a writ of habeas corpus, upon which relator claims that the sentence of three years’ imprisonment in the three State cases ran concurrently with the three year sentence in the Federal penitentiary, and that he is entitled to release from the State penitentiary. The trial judge ascertained and certified the facts as herein related, and made the writ returnable to this Court in accordance with the Act of the 48th Legislature, page 233, Chapter 354, amending Art. 119, C. C. P.

The question presented is not free from difficulty. The confusion arises from the dual capacity in which the Sheriff of Dallas County acted as the custodian of both United States and *436 State prisoners, which confusion would likely not have arisen under other circumstances. As supporting his claim that he served his three year sentence in the State cases at the same time he was incarcerated in the Federal Penitentiary at Ft. Leavenworth relator relies largely upon Ex parte Lawson, 98 Tex. Cr. R. 544, 266 S. W. 1101. In that case accused had been convicted in the UnKfcd States Court and was serving a term of imprisonment under that judgment. The Federal authorities delivered him to the State authorities and he was convicted in the State court of an offense against the State laws. The trial judge, with knowledge of the Federal judgment did not make the sentence in the State case cumulative of that in the Federal case. Not having done so, it implied an intent that the sentence in the State court should run concurrently with the sentence in the Federal case. Lawson was immediately re-delivered to the Federal authorities. If relator in the present case had been surrendered to the State authorities and had served his term in the State cases, and then been taken to the Federal penitentiary and sought relief because the sentence in the Federal Court had not been made cumulative, the same question decided in Lawson’s case would be present. The opinion in Lawson’s case quotes Art. 882 C.C.P. as providing that “the term (of imprisonment) shall commence from the time of the sentence, or, in case of appeal, from the time of the affirmance of the sentence.”

The Lawson case was adverted to in a California case, Ex parte Sichofsky, 257 Pac. 439, 53 A.L.R. 615, but was not followed, a difference in the statutes of the two states being noted. We have the same situation now arising from changes in our own statute. The Lawson case was decided in 1924. In the 1925 Revision of our Code of Criminal Procedure, Art. 822, as it formerly read passed out of the statute, and in lieu thereof it was provided in Art. 819, C.C.P. as follows:

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Bluebook (online)
187 S.W.2d 985, 148 Tex. Crim. 432, 1945 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 758, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ex-parte-j-l-cox-texcrimapp-1945.