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144 Ala. 28

Coker v. State

Supreme Court of Alabama

Decided April 3, 1906

Supreme Court of Alabama · decided 1906-04-03

Heard before Hon. J. T. Lackland. The defendant ivas convicted of murder in the first degree and sentenced to the penitentiary for the term of his natural life. Just prior to arraignment, and when called upon for his plea the defendant moved the court to quash the indictment for that the minutes of the court did not shew an organization of the grand jury which returned the bill. The motion was overruled.

Relies on Birmingham Union Railway Co. v. Hale · Keith v. State · Van Dyke v. State

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1906-04-03

How this case has been cited

Cited by 4 later decisions — most recently August 1999

4 state decisions

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Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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ANDERSON, J.

¶1The'motion of the defendant to quash the indictment in this case, “because the original grand jury venire was not set out in the minutes of the court,” was properly overruled. The indictment was returned at the spring term, and it does not appear that the venire was then incorporated in the minutes of the court. The record shows that there was no adjournment of said spring term sine die, but that an order was made, in pursuance of section 917 of the Code of 1896, adjourning the court until July 17th. It further appeal's that before said adjourned, or July, term was ended the original grand jury venire became a part of the minutes of the court. The adjourned term was but a continuation or prolongation of the regular tetrm. — Whatley v. State, (Ala.) 39 South, 1014; Van Dyke v. State, 22 Ala. 57; Hundley v. Yonge, 69 Ala. 89. Courts have control of their records, and the right to make them conform to the truth, and the power remains until the term has been brought to a final close. Keith v. State, 91 Ala. 2, 8 South, 353, 10 L. R. A. 430; Carwile v. State, (Ala.) 39 South, 1024.

¶2The defendant cannot complain of the action of the court in recalling Juror Harrison. He was recalled at the instance of defendant’s counsel, and was challenged by the State.

¶3There was no error in the action of the court in excusing the juror who would not “hang a man on circumstantial evidence.” — Griffiin v. State, 90 Ala. 8 South. 670; Code, 1896, § 5091.

¶4There was no error in sustaining the objection of the State to the question to witness Mosely as to what the *32justice liad told him.

¶5No predicate was laid for the impeachment of Mosely as to what .he sáid after the coroner’s inquest, and the objection to the question as to what Mosely said after the inquest was properly sustained.

¶6The judgment of the circuit court is affirmed.

¶7Affirmed.

Weakley, C. J. and Tyson and Simpson, JJ., concur.
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