People v. Rudolph (1915) · DecisionDepot

People v. Rudolph

Name: California Superior Court Tentative Rulings
Creator: DecisionDepot
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

California Court of Appeal Oct 30, 1915 No. Crim. No. 320.Published

Before: Hart

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Holding. The court held that a prior conviction was validly established, that Penal Code section 1204 does not govern the evidentiary requirements for proving prior convictions charged in an information, and that the trial court properly refused a requested instruction regarding the scrutiny of officer testimony as it invaded the jury's province.

Issues

Whether a prior conviction is void if the trial occurred on a Sunday.
Whether Penal Code section 1204 prescribes the evidence required to prove a prior conviction charged in an information.
Whether the court erred in refusing an instruction to scrutinize the testimony of public officers.

Disposition. affirmed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“The point is without a predicate for its support.”

“It is very plain that said section does not pretend to prescribe either the quantum or the character of the evidence essential to the proof of a prior conviction”

“the instruction bears upon the question of the weight of testimony, and, therefore, invades territory exclusively allotted to the jury”

Synopsis

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Sonoma County and from an order denying a new trial. Emmet Seawell, Judge.

The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.

HART, J.

Convicted under an information filed by the district attorney of Sonoma County in the superior court of said county of the crime of petit larceny with a prior conviction of the same offense, the defendant brings the cause to this court on an appeal from the judgment and the order denying him a new trial.

The information first charges the defendant with having unlawfully and feloniously stolen, taken and carried away “one brace and drill of the value of four dollars, the personal property of one John Bonne.” It then charges: “That the said defendant, Prank Rudolph, before the commission of the offense charged in this complaint, to wit, on the 2d day of November, 1914, was in the Recorder’s Court of the City of Petaluma, County of Sonoma, State of California, convicted of the crime of petit larceny, and which said judgment of conviction has never been annulled, reversed or set aside.” (Pen. Code, sec. 969.)

The defendant pleaded not guilty to each of the charges thus laid against him.

The first point made by the defendant is that the prior conviction of the defendant of petit larceny as charged in the information is void, inasmuch, so he asserts, as the trial of the defendant on said charge and his conviction thereof were had and obtained upon Sunday, a legal holiday or nonjudicial day. (Code Civ. Proc., secs. 10, 133 and 134.)

The point is without a predicate for its support.

To establish the prior conviction the people introduced in evidence the record of the police court of the city of Peta

[685]

luma showing such previous conviction, and therefrom it appears that, as alleged in the information, the trial of the defendant upon the charge of petit larceny was held on the second day of November, 1914, and that on that day a judgment of conviction was rendered against him. The second day of November, 1914, fell on Monday—a fact of which we are authorized to take judicial notice. (Code Civ. Proc., sec. 1875, subd. 8.)

The second point upon which the defendant relies for a reversal is that the evidence of the prior conviction as presented by the people, measured by the provisions of section 1204 of the Penal Code, was insufficient to establish that charge in the information. The section mentioned reads:

People v. Rudolph

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Synopsis

HART, J.

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