County of Los Angeles v. Cline

SHAW, J.

In mandate. Respondent is sheriff of Los Angeles County, having been elected to said office at the general election in 1914. At the time of his election, and ever since, Los Angeles County has operated under a freeholders’ charter, which provides that the board of supervisors shall by ordinance fix the compensation of all elective officers, which includes the sheriff. On June 2, 1913, said board, by an ordinance duly passed pursuant to the power so granted, fixed the salary of the sheriff of said county at the sum of four thousand dollars per year, which, as therein declared, was in full compensation for the performance of all official services required by law. The charter provided: “That all fees collected by any county officer, board or commission shall .be paid into the county treasury on the first Monday of each calendar month, together with a detailed statement of the same in writing, a duplicate copy of which shall be filed with the auditor at the same time. ’ ’

In the month of February, 1918, for services rendered by respondent as such sheriff covering the time necessarily consumed in delivering prisoners and insane persons to state institutions, he received from the state the sum of $496. The question involved is whether or not respondent is, as he claims, entitled to retain said sum so received, for his own use, or required to turn the same into the county treasury and file therewith a detailed statement of the same in writing, and also file a duplicate copy thereof with the auditor. Respondent’s refusal to comply with said provision of the charter is based upon sections 4175 and 4176 of the Political Code, which provide that there shall be allowed to the sheriff by the state, to be retained by him for his own use, a per diem of five dollars for the time necessarily consumed in delivering prisoners and insane persons to state institutions to which they have been legally committed. On the other hand, petitioner insists that the ordinance is the measure of respondent’s right to compensation, and that, since the ordinance fixes his salary at four

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thousand dollars per year in full compensation for his services and the charter requires all fees earned or collected by him for official services rendered to be turned into the county treasury ,• such fees so earned and received belong to the county.