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2 D.C. 409

United States v. Thompson

Decided May 15, 1823

Indictment, for assault and battery on Leonard Adams, a constable, who came to the assistance of R. Stevens, a constable, to take the defendant upon a warrant from N. S. Wise, a justice of the peace for this county, upon a charge upon the oath of Samuel Thompson, of having violently beaten negro Griffin, the slave of Jonah Thompson.

Decided 1823-05-15

The Court(ThrustoN, J., absent,)

¶1instructed the jury that the warrant was void because not signed by the justice ; the signature in pencil not being deemed by the Court a signature, because it is liable to be so easily obliterated.

¶2But the Court said that if a warrant contains on its face a cause of arrest within the jurisdiction of the magistrate, and purports to have been issued within his local jurisdiction, and is, in other respects, formal, the officer is bound to execute it, and resistance is unlawful; although, in fact, the offence was not committed within the local jurisdiction of the magistrate.

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