No. 333. Warrent for arrest of apprentice, under Code Criminal Procedure, § 928. IN THE NAME OF THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK ........ .a justice of the peace of the town [or city] of............in said county by....... against one............a person regularly apprenticed to the said...... according to law, showing that the said..... .has willfully absented himself from duty and refuses longer to serve the said.. Now this is to command you that you arrest the said.. forthwith have him before me at my office in the........ on the........day....... ..of... .and FORMS AND INSTRUCTIONS UNDER CODE OF CRIMINAL PROCEDURE, TITLE X, PART VI, SEOTIONS 941-949. To District Attorneys: It is not considered necessary to issue extended instructions or forms for the guidance of district attorneys, who are officers learned in the law - except to promote uniformity of returns from county clerks. The duties of the district attorney arise under section 941 of Title X, Part VI of the Code of Criminal Procedure, and are not directly related to this office, but with the county clerk of his county. The county clerk is, however, greatly dependent upon the district attorney of his county, for such statements as will enable such county clerk to promptly make an intelligent report to the Secretary of State as to convictions in criminal courts of record. By section 941 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the duty is imposed upon the district attorney of the county in which any criminal court of record is held, to furnish, within ten days after the adjournment of said court, to the clerk of such court, such a description of the offense committed by every person convicted of crime, abridged from the indictment, as will be sufficient to maintain the averments relating to such offense, or necessary to be made in an indictment for a second offense. The object of the law is doubtless chiefly to furnish evidence which will be sufficient, on an indictment for a second offense, to prove the facts of a prior conviction.* A general statement that the defendant was convicted of, say robbery, or any other similar and general description of the offense, will not prove the *See, also, sections 8, 9 and 10 of article first, title 6, chapter 2, part 4 of the Revised Statutes. facts necessary to be established on the trial of an indictment for a second or subsequent offense. Such an indictment must aver that the defendant, at a particular court, held at a particular time and place, before persons to be named, was convicted of a specific offense, to-wit, of robbery, first (or second) degree, which must be stated with as much precision and certainty, as to time, place, manner, person on whom committed, and with all the legal requisites and particulars to constitute crime, as in the first indictment. Of course these averments must be sustained by proof; and the description furnished by the district attorney is the proof which the law intends should be adduced. This is done to promote public justice, to save trouble to district attorneys or their successors, in future years, and to avoid the large expense of procuring exemplifications of records of conviction. These general remarks will, perhaps, be sufficient to guide district attorneys in preparing their statements. But as section 949 of the Code of Criminal Procedure requires the Secretary of State to publish forms and instructions for its execution, such forms and instructions will be herein presented. To furnish forms for all cases of criminal convictions would be a work of unnecessary labor and of no practical utility. All that can be done is to give general directions applicable to the great mass of cases, and a few instances of forms to exemplify the instructions. Generally speaking, it will be more convenient, and more likely to insure accuracy, to recite the charging part of the indictment, omitting only the synonymous words which it sometimes contains. Thus, in a case of perjury, where the indictment necessarily contains special averments, the statement of conviction may be in the following form: John Jackson, having been indicted, for that, at a Circuit of the Supreme Court, held at, etc., in and for the county of on the day of 188 a certain issue joined in the Supreme Court between Thomas Stiles, plaintiff, and Rebecca Stiles, defendant, in an action for divorce (or other civil action), came on to be tried before said Circuit Court, and a jury of the county then and there duly impaneled and sworn; and that the said John Jackson was then and there produced as a witness by and on behalf of the said Thomas Stiles, and was then and there duly sworn according to law, etc. (reciting the substantial part of the indictment); and having been duly tried by a jury, and found guilty of the offense of which he was so indicted, to-wit, perjury; he is thereupon by the court here sentenced to imprisonment in the State prison at Auburn for years. A similar form will be necessary in stating convictions for duelling, incest, rape and many other crimes, and particularly certain misdemeanors in which special averments are necessary to describe the offense. There are some cases in which an abbreviated form may adopted, of which the following are examples: be Murder, first degree.—John Jackson, having been duly tried by a jury and found guilty of murder in the first degree, for which he had been indicted, in feloniously killing Thomas Stiles, on the in the county of day of at the town by feloniously shooting the said of Arson in the first degree.- James Jackson, having been duly tried by a jury, and found guilty of arson in the first degree, for which he had been indicted, in willfully and feloniously burning in the night-time, on the in the county of day of at the town of the dwelling-house of John Stiles, in which there was at the time a human being, to-wit: Nancy Stiles, he is sentenced to be imprisoned, etc. Manslaughter.-James Williams, having been duly tried by a jury, and found guilty of manslaughter in the first degree (or whatever degree was found by the jury), for which he had been indicted, in killing John Doe on the day of at the town of in the county of in the heat of passion, but in a cruel and unusual manner, by stabbing him with a dangerous weapon, to-wit: a knife, he is sentenced to imprisonment in the State prison at Sing Sing for years. The various degrees of manslaughter depend so much on the circumstances of each case, that, as a general rule, the form of reciting the charging part of the indictment, as given before in the case of perjury, had better be adopted, as there will be much less liability to mistake. Rape.- James Jackson, having been duly tried by a jury, and found guilty of rape, for which he had been indicted, in carnally and unlawfully knowing Julia Jones, a female child under the age of ten years, on the day of he is sentenced to imyears. Assault in first degree.- James Thomas, having been duly tried by a jury, and found guilty of shooting a pistol loaded with gunpowder and ball at William Townsend, on the, etc., at the town, etc., with intent to kill the said Townsend, for which he has been indicted, he is sentenced, etc. Grand larceny, second degree.- John Jackson, having been duly tried by a jury, and found guilty of having on the, etc., at the town, etc., feloniously taken and carried away one gold watch of the value of twenty-six dollars, the personal property of William Jones, for which offense he has been indicted, he is sentenced to imprisonment, etc. When the conviction is founded on a plea of confession, the commencement of the form should vary from those before given, and should be stated thus: John Jackson, having been indicted for grand larceny, second degree, in having on the at the town of, etc., feloniously stolen, taken and carried away one gold watch of the value of twenty-six dollars, the personal property of William Jones, and on being arraigned upon the said indictment having confessed the said offense, and pleaded guilty to said indictment, he is sentenced, etc. Where there are several counts in an indictment, intended to describe the same offense, the statement of the crime need not be repeated according to the formal variations in the different counts, but should be stated once only, according to the count which was proved on the trial. The foregoing instructions are addressed more particularly to district attorneys, although the same will be useful to clerks of criminal courts, to enable them to prepare entries of judgments if that duty is neglected by the district attorney. To County Clerks: The following appear to be the only instructions necessary to be given to clerks of criminal courts. (See §§ 942 and 943, Code of Criminal Procedure.) They are specially requested to report promptly every case of neglect, by a district attorney, to furnish them with the statements required by the statute to be prepared by him. Every judgment must be entered in the court minutes at the time of the sentence, or before the court adjourns, and the transcript must be sent within twenty days after the adjournment; and if the district attorney has omitted to prepare the statements of the offenses upon which convictions have been had, the clerk must do it for his own protection, and submit them to the court before entering them in the minutes. |