Ingram v. Warden of Maryland House of Correction

Horney, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is the third time that the applicant has applied to this Court for leave to appeal from the denial and dismissal of his petitions for relief after he had been convicted and sentenced ⁵⁹⁹ to eight years in the Penitentiary on a charge of attempted burglary, to which he plead guilty on March 16, 1956. The second application, which was for post conviction relief, was granted in Ingram v. Warden, 219 Md. 690 , 149 A. 2d 915 (1959), because the lower court had made no finding as to the applicant’s indigency and had not appointed counsel as the Uniform Post Conviction Procedure Act [Code (1959 Cum. Supp.), Art. 27, secs. 645A-645J] required.

On this application, also for post conviction relief, the applicant contends, inter alia, as he did below, (i) that he was not offered or allowed counsel; (ii) that the eight-year sentence was cruel and unusual punishment; (iii) that he was not afforded an opportunity to speak as to why sentence should not be passed; and (iv) that he was not informed of his right to a new trial and to an appeal. All of these questions, with one minor exception, were previously and finally litigated in Ingram v. Warden, 218 Md. 649 , 145 A. 2d 766 (1958), and cannot be raised again in this proceeding. Section 645A (a), supra; Byrd v. Warden, 219 Md. 681 , 147 A. 2d 701 (1959). In the first Ingram case [ 218 Md. 649 ], supra, which was an application for leave to appeal from a denial of the writ of habeas corpus, the per curiam stated that the application was denied for the reasons set out in the opinion of Judge McLaughlin below.

A re-examination of that opinion, which is in the record, confirms our finding that all of the questions there presented had been passed upon below. However, we note now that Judge McLaughlin in passing on the question of whether the sentence of eight years was cruel and unusual punishment—although he knew that the