County of Los Angeles v. City of Los Angeles

McKee, J. By a statute passed April 1, 1880, relative to the courts of justice of the State and the various officers connected therewith, it was provided that in every city in the State having ten thousand and not more than twenty thousand inhabitants, there shall be elected one justice of the peace, to whom shall be paid a salary of two thousand dollars per annum, payable out of the general fund in the city treasury. It was also provided that the justices should collect all the fees, chargeable by law, for services rendered by them, and report under oath, on the first Monday in every month, the amount of said fees, to the treasurer of the city, and pay the same into the treasury of the city to the credit of its general fund. (§ 103, Stats, 1880, p. 77; Coggins v. Sacramento, 59 Cal. 599.)

Under that statute, a justice of the peace who had been elected in and for the city of Los Angeles, between January, 1880, and January, 1883, and his successor in office since January, 1883, collected fines imposed and forfeitures incurred in cases tried and determined by them respectively, for violations of the laws of the State and of the city, and each reported to the treasurer, under ordinances of the city, the amount he had received, and paid the same into the city treasury.

The fines and forfeitures thus collected and paid over to the city treasury aggregated the sum of eleven thousand six hundred and five dollars, about one half of which, it is stipulated, were imposed or incurred for violations of State laws, and the other half were imposed as fines for violating city ordinances.

.The county of Los Angeles claims to be entitled to this money. Her contention is that the justices of the peace were [478]required by law to pay all fines and forfeitures collected by them into the county treasury. The contention seems to be well founded. Section 1570 of the Penal Code provides: “All fines and forfeitures collected in any court, except Police Courts, must be applied to the payment of the costs of the case in which the fine is imposed or the forfeiture incurred, and after such costs are paid, the residue must be paid to the county treasurer of the county in which the court is held.” Section 1457 also provides: “Upon payment of a fine before or after commitment, . . .' . the money must be applied to the payment of the expenses of the prosecution, and the residue must be paid over within ten days to the county or city treasurer, according as the offense is prosecuted in a Justice’s or Police Court.” These sections of the Code were not expressly repealed by the statute of 1880, nor were they repealed by implication, for between their provisions and those of the statute there is no inconsistency. The sections were therefore in force at the time of the collection of the fines and forfeitures in controversy, and they constituted the law regulating their disposition. Under that law, the duty was imposed upon officers collecting fines and forfeitures to pay them, in the manner prescribed by law, into the county treasury; and the penal law enforced that duty by declaring that the officer who refused or neglected, for thirty days after collecting such fines or forfeitures, to pay over the same according to law, was guilty of a misdemeanor. (§ 427, Pen. Code.)