In Re Bridwell

BARNARD, P. J.

This is an application for a writ of

habeas corpus.

The petitioner was tried in the justice’s court of Santa Ana township, county of Orange, upon a complaint charging him with failure to support his minor children, a misdemeanor; the complaint charging that this offense was committed within the county of Orange, state of California. He was found guilty and sentenced to imprisonment in the county jail for the term of one year. It fully appears that the petitioner and his said minor children were not residents of Santa Ana township, but that

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they were, and for more than five years had been, residents of the township of La Brea, in the county of Orange. Petitioner attacks the jurisdiction of the justice’s court of Santa Ana township over the offense charged. This township has a population in excess of thirty thousand, and the question presented is whether or not a justice’s court in such a township has county-wide jurisdiction over such a misdemeanor.

While section 1425 of the Penal Code formerly gave to justices’ courts jurisdiction over offenses committed within the respective counties in which such courts are established, this section was amended in 1929 (Stats. 1929, p. 861), and now reads as follows:

“The justices’ courts have jurisdiction as follows:

“1. In cities, cities and counties, towns and judicial townships, having a population of thirty thousand or more, said courts shall have jurisdiction in all criminal cases amounting to misdemeanor only, except those of which the juvenile court is given original jurisdiction.

“2. In those having a population of less than thirty thousand said courts shall have jurisdiction in all criminal eases amounting to misdemeanor only, punishable by fine not exceeding one thousand dollars, or imprisonment not exceeding six months, or by both such fine and imprisonment. ’ ’

We think the question before us has been practically decided in the case of

Antilla

v.