Givner v. State

Bkune, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The appellant, Charles Givner, was tried before a justice of the peace, sitting as a police magistrate in the City of Baltimore, on a charge of assault by taking hold of a young woman. The alleged offense occurred on July 1, 1954, and the hearing took place on July 3, 1954. The accused was represented by counsel (not his present counsel).

The magistrate called the case and asked if the accused was ready for hearing. His counsel replied that he was. The magistrate then inquired whether the defendant wanted to be tried by him (the magistrate) or wished to pray a jury trial. Through his counsel the defendant elected to be tried before the magistrate and entered a plea of “not guilty.” After a hearing the magistrate found him guilty and sentenced him to six months in jail.

The defendant then appealed to the Criminal Court of Baltimore City. There he was also represented by counsel (still not his present counsel) and elected to be tried by the court without a jury. He was again convicted and again sentenced to six months’ imprisonment. This sentence was stricken out two days later pending a motion for a new trial.

Thereupon, the defendant, through one of his present counsel, filed a motion for a new trial. This motion was heard by the Supreme Bench of Baltimore City in which tribunal jurisdiction is vested to hear such motions pertaining to trials in the Criminal Court of Baltimore by Section 33 of Article 4 of the Constitution. The motion was denied. Subsequently, on November 22, 1954, the defendant was sentenced by the Criminal Court to ninety days’ imprisonment.

Thereafter, on December 1, 1954, the defendant filed what he designates as a writ of error. This is based upon several alleged errors on the part of the Supreme Bench of Baltimore City in refusing to allow the defendant to require the production by subpoena of police records and ⁴ of juvenile court records relating to the young woman who made the charge of assault and in refusing to allow her and her brother to be summoned to appear and to testify before the Supreme Bench on the defendant’s motion for a new trial. The defendant contended that these witnesses had perjured themselves as to a number of matters. On February 5, 1955, the defendant filed in this Court a petition for a writ of certiorari, the grounds for which to some extent overlapped the grounds of complaint set forth in his “writ of error”, but this petition added other attacks upon the procedure followed by the Supreme Bench.

This petition sought review of the action of the Supreme Bench under Code (1951), Article 5, Section 105. That Section authorizes this Court to review a final judgment of a Circuit Court of any County or of any Court of the City of Baltimore rendered upon an appeal from a Justice of the Peace, in either a civil or criminal case, if (1) such review “is necessary to secure uniformity of decision” or (2) “there are other special circumstances rendering it desirable and in the public interest that the case should be reviewed.” Not finding either ground for review to be present, this Court denied the petition for a writ of certiorari on February 8, 1955. It is firmly established that where a Circuit Court in a County, or its equivalent in Baltimore City, in hearing an appeal from a justice of the peace, acts, not in the exercise of its common law jurisdiction, but as a court of special jurisdiction, its judgment, within the limits of the special jurisdiction conferred upon it, is not only binding but final. Robb v. State, 190 Md. 641 , 60 A. 2d 211; Lambros v. Brown, 184 Md. 350 , 41 A. 2d 78 ; Brack v. State, 187 Md. 542 , 51 A. 2d 171 ; Rayner v. State, 52 Md. 368 .

The general rule is also firmly established that the granting or refusal of a new trial lies within the sound discretion of the trial court and that no appeal will lie from its action thereon. See (among a dozen or so Maryland criminal cases which might be cited) Archer v. State, 45 Md. 457 ; Haley v. State, 200 Md. 72 , 88 A. 2d 312 ; ⁵ Williams v. State, 204 Md. 55 , 102 A. 2d 714 ; Madison v. State, 205 Md. 425 , 109 A. 2d 96 . Because of our discretionary right to review on certiorari cases originally tried before a magistrate and appealed to the Circuit Court of a County or to an appropriate Court of Baltimore City, we think it unnecessary to pass upon the distinction suggested by the State between cases in which there is a right of appeal to this Court and cases in which there is no such right. Cf.

Board of Medical Examiners v. Steward, 207 Md. 108 , 113 A. 2d 426 , where the decision of the Circuit Court was final and we therefore could not review its decision (sitting as a Court en banc) that it lacked jurisdiction. The appellant does not dispute either of the general rules stated above but seeks to avoid their application on the ground that the Supreme Bench abused its discretion in refusing to permit him to summon the two principal witnesses for the prosecution to testify at the hearing of his motion for a new trial or to summon the custodians of certain records to produce such records, all for the purpose of attacking the credibility of the two principal witnesses against him. The points upon which their veracity was attacked and the bases for the attack were, however, contained in documents submitted to the Supreme Bench through a petition and affidavit. In support of his position on this