People v. Vanderburg

WEYAND, J.,

pro tem.

The defendant, a prisoner regularly confined within the state prison, at Folsom, California, was, while serving his term of imprisonment, taken from said prison to the county of Trinity to work in road construction in that county, and while there he escaped from the surveillance of the prison guards. He was convicted of the offense and prosecutes this appeal.

The notice of appeal states that the appeal is taken from the final judgment of conviction and from the order denying defendant’s motion for a new trial.

The grounds of the motion for a new trial do not appear. However, in the written application for a transcript of the testimony the “grounds of said appeal” as therein set forth are the usual grounds of motion for a new trial. However that may be, the ease will be dealt with as if a proper motion for a new trial was embodied in the record.

Appellant appears in his own behalf, and by a lengthy brief urges four main points wherein error was committed

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to his prejudice. First, it is claimed that as the offense was committed in Trinity County the superior court of Sacramento County had no jurisdiction; secondly, that no proper proof was given as to the fact that he was under surveillance of a prison guard when he escaped; thirdly, that a certain instruction as to impeachment was erroneous; fourthly, that the section of the law under which this conviction was had is unconstitutional, in that it does not operate uniformly.

The superior court of Sacramento County had jurisdiction. In the case of

Bradford

v.

Glenn, as Judge of the Superior Court of Sacramento County,

188 Cal. 350 [205 Pac. 449], this question was before the supreme court of the state, under proceedings in

mandamus,

and it was there held that “a person serving a sentence of imprisonment in a state prison is, in contemplation of law, a prisoner therein, as well when at work outside under the surveillance of prison .guards as when confined within its walls, so that if he escapes when outside he escapes from a prison, within the meaning of section 787” (Pen. Code). Section 787 of the Penal Code provides that a charge of escaping from a prison may be tried in any county of the state.