Clifford v. State

Grason, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This case comes before this Court upon a writ of error to the Criminal Court of Baltimore, and it is alleged that there ⁵⁷⁶ is error in the judgment of that Court in. this, that it does not particularly designate the day on which the execution of the judgment is to commence or terminate. The judgment is, that “ the said Samuel Clifford serve and labor in the Penitentiary for the period of ten years.” It was contended that, as the judgment was uncertain in consequence of its not having fixed the time, at which the execution was to commence or end, the judgment is void, and that the plaintiff in error is consequently entitled to be discharged. It is perfectly clear that the judgment of the Court below, imposed upon the plaintiff in error for the crime of which he was convicted, confinement in the Penitentiary for the period of ten years.

It is equally clear that the judgment could not be executed according to its terms, unless the party actually served and labored in the Penitentiary during the whole time named in the judgment. The execution of judgments, in criminal cases, cannot in all cases take place immediately after the judgments are pronounced, inasmuch as the Courts having criminal jurisdiction are held, in some instances, in parts of the State, distant from the city of Baltimore, in which the Penitentiary is situated, and more or less-time must be occupied after the judgments are rendered, in removing the convicts to the institution in which they are to be confined. * Against the position that execution of judgments in criminal cases commence with the delivery of the convicts at the penitentiary, it was urged that the sheriffs might keep parties who had been sentenced, in their custody for some time after judgment, before taking them to the