In Re Lindsley

FINCH, P. J.

This is an application for a writ of

habeas corpus.

The petitioner was adjudged guilty of contempt of court and sentenced to pay a fine, or in default of the payment thereof to be imprisoned in the county jail. He is now so imprisoned. The petition alleges that the affidavit upon which the proceeding for contempt is based is insufficient and that no proof of the facts stated in the affidavit was produced at the hearing. It appears from the affidavit that an action against the petitioner for criminal libel was pending in the superior court of Humboldt County; that the cause had been set to be tried on the twenty-sixth day of October, 1925; that the names of sixty persons had been drawn from the trial jury box from which to impanel a jury to try the cause; that the petitioner is the editor of a newspaper published and circulated in the city of Eureka and county of Humboldt, and having a large number of subscribers in that county; that after the drawing of said names from the jury-box, in four separate

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issues of said newspaper, the petitioner published therein certain statements, which are set out at length, attacking the district attorney of the county and impugning his motives in respect to his prosecution of said criminal action and reflecting upon the character and veracity of the prosecuting witness therein, for the purpose and with the intent of influencing the jurors who had been so drawn and of influencing witnesses against testifying for the prosecution and of interfering with the administration of justice. Among other things, the published statements referred to the prosecuting witness as “a former admitted stool pigeon, and the man who made a perjured expense bill against the county, later stolen from the supervisors’ files.” Since jurisdiction is the only question which can be considered on

habeas corpus

in a case of this character, the allegations of the affidavit must be taken as true and it must be presumed that the publications were made for the purpose of influencing the conduct of the jurors and the testimony of the witnesses in the trial about to be had.

The purpose of a contempt proceeding is not that of punishing a person for the mere publication of libelous statements against witnesses or officers of the court or the judge thereof. The laws relating to libel are enacted for the accomplishment of that purpose. The only legitimate purpose of a contempt proceeding, in a case such as this, is to punish for the improper interference with the orderly administration of justice in the trial of a case in court and the decision thereof.