State v. Rosenblatt

83 S.W. 975, 185 Mo. 114, 1904 Mo. LEXIS 303
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedDecember 13, 1904
StatusPublished
Cited by32 cases

This text of 83 S.W. 975 (State v. Rosenblatt) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Rosenblatt, 83 S.W. 975, 185 Mo. 114, 1904 Mo. LEXIS 303 (Mo. 1904).

Opinion

GANTT, P. J.

From a conviction and sentence by the criminal court of Buchanan county, the defendant has taken his writ of error to this court. Preliminary to any investigation to the sufficiency of the indictment, the Attorney-General has moved to dismiss the writ of error on the ground that the cause was not prosecuted to a final judgment in the criminal court, because there is a motion in arrest of judgment yet pending before and undisposed of by the criminal court, and also because the record shows' that defendant entered a plea of guilty and agreed to the judgment against him and that no writ of error will lie in such case. For a proper understanding of the questions thus raised, we must look to the record certified to us.

- It appears that a grand jury was duly impaneled [117]*117at the March term, 1903, of the criminal court of Buchanan county, and on the 4th day of April, 1903, the said grand jury returned into court an indictment against the defendant for setting up and keeping divers gambling devices, adapted, devised and designed for the purpose of playing games of chance for money and property, and enticed and permitted divers persons to the grand jury unknown to bet and play at and upon and by means of said gaming tables and devices. After-wards on the 6th day of April, 1903, the defendant was duly arraigned and pleaded not guilty to said indictment.

Afterwards on tbe 26th day of April, 1903, and at the same term the record in said cause recites: “Comes now the prosecuting attorney, and the defendant in open court withdraws his plea of not guilty heretofore entered herein, and enters plea of. guilty, and by agreement his punishment is assessed at six months in the county jail. Wherefore it is ordered and adjudged by the court that the said Lee Rosenblatt be confined in the common jail of Buchanan county, Missouri, for the period of six months from the 26th day of June, 1903, for the crime of setting up and keeping gambling devices or until he is otherwise discharged by due course of law.”

It further appears that on the same day and after the sentence of the court, the defendant filed a motion in arrest of judgment and the record is silent as to any disposition of said motion.

It will be observed that the State makes this motion to dismiss, and that the defendant made no objection and took no exception to the action of the court in sentencing him before his motion in arrest was disposed of by the criminal court.

The question then is, was there such a final judgment of the criminal court as to authorize a writ of error therefrom? Writs of error under our statute and practice can only be prosecuted from final judg-[118]*118ments. [Sec. 2697, R. S. 1899.] And the same is true of appeals. [Sec. 2696, R. S. 1899; State v. Watson, 95 Mo. l. c. 414; State v. Love, 52 Mo. 106; State v. Gregory, 38 Mo. 502; State v. Copeland, 65 Mo. 497.] That the criminal court did sentence the defendant is too plain for discussion or doubt., "What effect then is to be given to the motion in arrest filed after this final judgment?

Both at common law and by our statute a motion in arrest must be filed before sentence. Thus Chitty in his Criminal Law (5 Ed.), vol. 1, page 663, says, “The defendant may move at any time in arrest of judgment, before the sentence is actually pronounced upon him;” and again, “But if the sentence is once pronounced, though before the actual entry of the judgment, the court are not bound to attend at all to a motion of this nature, even though a formal error should be discovered, sufficient to reverse the proceedings, but the defendant is left to his writ of error; though, as we have seen, the court may, without any motion, arrest the judgment, and may alter the sentence any time during the same term.”

Bishop in his work on Criminal Procedure (1 Ed.), section 852, adopts Chitty’s statement of the practice on this subject.

The practice in this State in criminal cases as to motions for new trial and in arrest of judgment is different from the practice in civil cases. In the latter we have not followed the common law practice of waiting for four days after the rendition of the verdict before having the judgment signed, and entered, but it is the approved practice in civil cases for the clerk to enter the verdict on the record, and the judgment upon it, and the right to file a motion for new trial or in arrest within the four days allowed by the statute is not affected by the entry of the judgment before the filing of the motion for new trial or in arrest, whereas in criminal cases it is specifically provided by section 2689, Revised [119]*119Statutes 1899, that such motion shall be filed “before judgment ,” and the same is true of motions in arrest. [See. 2690, E. S. 1899.] And such is the accepted practice in this State.

It is the evident purpose of our statute to continue the common law practice in this respect in criminal cases and it is apparent that a motion in arrest • after final judgment in a criminal cause in no manner affects the finality of the judgment, and such a motion .does not operate to stay the effect of the judgment, but as is said by Chitty, “the court is not bound to attend at all to a motion of this nature.”

In Illinois'where the common law practice still obtains to a large degree it was ruled in Parr v. Van Horne, 40 Ill. 122, that where.a motion for a new trial was filed after final judgment, the rendering of the judgment would of itself be regarded as a denial of the motion, and would be none the less a final judgment because of the omission of a formal overruling of the motion, and that a motion to dismiss a writ of error on that ground must be denied. While such a rule would not be followed in this State in a civil case, in as much as we practically retain the common law practice in criminal cases, there is much force in the opinion in that case when applied to a criminal case under our practice. [Ex parte Craig, 130 Mo. 595.] It follows that the motion to dismiss the writ of error because a motion in arrest was filed after the final sentence of the criminal court, is not well taken, and must be denied.

The remaining ground of the motion is that the judgment was rendered on a plea of guilty. This point has likewise been repeatedly ruled adverse to the contention of the State. Numerous decisions of this court attest that a defendant in a criminal case may take advantage of a material defect apparent of record, though such point be raised for the first time in this court. [McGee v. State, 8 Mo. 495; State v. Meyers, 99 Mo. 107.] And if no crime is charged in the indictment, [120]*120then hone is confessed by pleading guilty thereto, and the effect of such a plea only amounts to an admission by record of the truth of whatever is sufficiently alleged in the indictment, and will not prevent the defendant from taking advantage of the defects apparent of record on writ of error. [1 Bish. New Crim. Proc., 795; State v. Levy, 119 Mo. 434; Fletcher v. State, 7 Eng. (12 Ark.) 169; Wharton’s Crim. Pl. and Prac. (9 Ed.), sec. 413; Henderson v. State, 60 Ind. 296; Arbintrode v. State, 67 Ind. 267; Com. v. Kennedy, 131 Mass. 584.]

II. Proceeding then to the examination of the errors assigned by defendant, the only question presented is the sufficiency of the indictment to support the judgment and sentence of the criminal court. The indictment is in the words following:

' “State of Missouri, county of Buchanan, ss.:

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Bluebook (online)
83 S.W. 975, 185 Mo. 114, 1904 Mo. LEXIS 303, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-rosenblatt-mo-1904.