Stephens v. Bertrand

98 P.2d 410, 151 Kan. 270, 1940 Kan. LEXIS 102
CourtSupreme Court of Kansas
DecidedJanuary 27, 1940
DocketNo. 34,557
StatusPublished
Cited by19 cases

This text of 98 P.2d 410 (Stephens v. Bertrand) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Stephens v. Bertrand, 98 P.2d 410, 151 Kan. 270, 1940 Kan. LEXIS 102 (kan 1940).

Opinion

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Dawson, C. J.:

This is an appeal from an adverse judgment in habeas corpus proceedings in which appellant sought to be released from jail in Sedgwick county.

By his petition for the writ and the sheriff's return thereto it appears that on April 26, 1937, the appellant had been sentenced to a term of six months in the county jail and to pay a fine of $500, consequent upon his conviction on a charge of violating the prohibitory liquor law. On appeal to this court that judgment was affirmed. (State v. Stephens, 146 Kan. 660, 72 P. 2d 975.)

Following such affirmance, the petitioner seems to have been incarcerated in the county jail for some time — the record is not clear on this point — and on April 15, 1938, he applied to the district court for a parole, which was granted. The record, in part, reads:

“Now on this 15th day of April, 1938, . . . it is ordered . . . that the defendant be paroled from serving the balance of the jail sentence and from paying the fine levied in this case, upon the condition that the defendant violate no laws of the state of Kansas for a period of two (2) years, and that he pay the costs of the action, including the parole officer’s fees of two dollars (S2) per year.”

[271]*271• At the time the parole was granted the court (District Judge I. N. Williams presiding) stated to appellant the conditions of the parole and those were accepted. The court reporter’s notes read:

“The Court: You will be paroled- from serving the balance of the jail sentence and the payment of the fine on condition that you do not violate the law and that you report to the court on the first of each term for a period of two years. Mr. Harley (county attorney) will tell you when that time is for .you to report; and there will be an additional $2 court costs for the parole officer. . . . This, you understand, is on condition that you do not violate the law.
“The Defendant: Yes, sir.
“The Court: And the court will not have to have any competent evidence to revoke this parole. If any complaint comes in concerning it, this parole will be revoked. People may come to me and you won’t know who they are, and Mr. Harley may not know who they are. Citizens might come and report that you are violating the parole, and if they do your parole will be revoked. Do you want to accept the parole on that condition?
“The Defendant: Yes, sir.
“The Court: That will be a parole from this sentence. . . .
“The Defendant: Yes, sir.
“The Court: That’s all.”

On May 31, 1939, the court made an order which, in part, reads:

“The parole heretofore granted herein be and the same is hereby revoked and the defendant, Robert L. Stephens, is ordered committed to the county •jail to serve the balance of his jail sentence and to pay the fine heretofore imposed, and -the sheriff of Sedgwick county is hereby ordered to apprehend the said defendant and confine him to the jail of Sedgwick county, Kansas, to serve the balance of said jail sentence.
(Signed) I. N. Williams, Judge.”

. On application of appellant, Judge Williams allowed a writ of habeas corpus, and the sheriff made his return thereto, following which the cause was heard by Hon. Ross McCormick, judge of division No. 1 of the district court of Sedgwick county. At the insistence of counsel for appellant, Judge McCormick permitted evidence to be introduced in extenso by various witnesses — the clerk of the police court, the sheriff’s clerk, the sheriff himself and his deputy, the parole officer of the court, and the clerk of the district court, all of whom testified that they had no information tending to show that appellant had violated his parole, and none of whom could give any intimation of the motive which had prompted Judge Williams to revoke the parole. By stipulation of counsel all files of earlier proceedings pertinent to the hearing were considered in evidence; and on June 26,1939, the district court (District Judge McCormick pre[272]*272siding) denied the writ, and the matter is brought here for review.

On the threshold of this review we encounter a barrier to any consideration of the matters assigned as error. That barrier is the statute which confers on the district court the power to grant paroles to persons convicted of crime. (Laws 1907, ch. 178, G. S. 1935, 62-2201 et seq.)„ Section 2 of that statute, in part, reads:

“The courts ... or the judge thereof . . . may, in their discretion, when satisfied that any person against whom a fine has been assessed or a jail sentence imposed by said court, or any person actually confined in jail under judgment of a justice of the peace, city court, or other like inferior court, . . . will, if permitted to go at large, not again violate the law, parole such person and permit him to go at large, upon such conditions and under such restrictions as the court or judge granting the parole shall see fit to impose; such court or judge may at any time, without notice to such person, terminate such parole by simply directing execution to issue on the judgment, or, in case the person shall have been actually confined in jail, the parole may be terminated by directing the sheriff or jailer to retake such person under the commitment already in his hands. . . .” (G. S. 1935, 62-2202.)

Section 14 of the same statute, in part, reads:

“. . . nor shall the action of any court or judge in granting or terminating a parole be subject to a review by an appellate court.” (G. S. 1935,62-2214.)

This court has repeatedly upheld the discretionary authority of the district court to revoke paroles. In the appeal of In re Patterson, 94 Kan. 439, 146 Pac. 1009, in which he complained of the summary revocation of his parole, this court, speaking through Chief Justice Johnston, said:

“The statute expressly provides that the court may grant the parole on such conditions and under such restrictions as it may see fit to impose. In its discretion it may attach any conditions to the parole that are not immoral, illegal or impossible of performance, and as the authority is to be exercised by a court or judge it is expressly provided that the parole may be terminated at any time and the convict remanded to prison without notice to him. It is competent for the legislature to provide that the court may, upon information that is satisfactory to it, revoke the parole and summarily remand the convict to prison to serve out a sentence legally imposed. The failure of the convict to observe the conditions of a parole is not a new offense, and the revocation of the parole and the returning of the convict to prison is not an added punishment for the offense of which he was convicted nor a punishment for any other offense, but it is rather a disciplinary regulation of prison management in carrying out the sentence of the law already imposed and growing out of the effort to ameliorate the condition of the convict. There was, therefore, no occasion for the making of an affidavit before petitioner’s rearrest, nor any necessity for the filing of an information or indictment, nor for providing a trial by a jury.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Herrera v. Koehn
Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2025
David Brian Miller
D. Kansas, 2023
Barnett v. Oliver
858 P.2d 1228 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 1993)
Dallam v. Hedrick
826 P.2d 511 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 1990)
Cuyahoga Metropolitan Housing Authority v. Watkins
491 N.E.2d 701 (Ohio Court of Appeals, 1984)
Koerner v. Custom Components, Inc.
603 P.2d 628 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 1979)
FRISBIE v. Director of Taxation
566 P.2d 29 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 1977)
Fancher v. Carson-Campbell, Inc.
530 P.2d 1225 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1975)
Jackson & Scherer, Inc. v. Washburn
496 P.2d 1358 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1972)
Washburn v. Andrew
496 P.2d 1367 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1972)
Letzig v. Rupert
495 P.2d 955 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1972)
Anderson v. Alexander
230 P.2d 770 (Oregon Supreme Court, 1951)
Reeves v. McAdoo
193 P.2d 233 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1948)
Wright v. Herzog
34 A.2d 460 (Court of Appeals of Maryland, 1943)
Knudson v. Linstrum
8 N.W.2d 495 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1943)
Francis v. Amrine
133 P.2d 124 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1943)
Christy Et Ux. v. Guild Et Ux.
121 P.2d 401 (Utah Supreme Court, 1942)
Boaz v. Amrine
113 P.2d 80 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1941)
Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Co. v. Board of County Commissioners
99 P.2d 828 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1940)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
98 P.2d 410, 151 Kan. 270, 1940 Kan. LEXIS 102, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/stephens-v-bertrand-kan-1940.