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24 N.C. 204

State v. . Cockerham

Supreme Court of North Carolina

Decided June 5, 1842

Supreme Court of North Carolina · decided 1842-06-05

This was an appeal from an order of his Honor Judge Bailey, made at the Spring Term, 1842, of Hay wood Supe - rior Court of Law.

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““The time at which a sentence shall be carried into execution forms no part of the judgment of the court. The judgment is the penalty of the law, as declared by the court, while the direction, with respect to the time of carrying it into effect, is in the nature of an award of execution. In this case the judgment, was that the defendant be imprisoned 2 calendar months, and the words, which follow in tho record, ‘from! and after the 1st of November next,’ direct the time of executing the judgment. The entry, indeed, would have been more formal, had the judgment and the mandate for carrying it into effect been separate and distinct. But, however informal, it can bo understood, in conformity to the law, as consisting of distinct parts, and therefore ought to he so understood. Upon the defendant appearing in court and his identity not being denied, and it being admitted that tho sentence of the court had not been executed, it was proper to make the necessary order for carrying the sentence into execution.””

quoted by 1 later decision, including Bernstein v. United States

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1842-06-05

How this case has been cited

Cited by 16 later decisions — most recently March 2018

1 federal appellate · 14 state decisions — followed in 10 states

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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.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

Gaston, J.

¶1 The time, at which a sentence shall be carried into execution, forms no part of the judgment of the court. The judgment is the penalty of the law, as declared by the court, while the direction, with respect to the time of carryiug it into eifect, is in the nature of an award of execution. In this case the judgment was that the defendant be imprisoned two calendar months; and the words, which follow in the record, “ from and after the 1st of November next,” direct the time of executing the judgment. The entry, indeed, would have been more formal, had the judgment and the mandate for carrying it into effect been separate and distinct, But, however informal, it can be understood, in conformity to the law, as consisting of distinct parts, and therefore ought to be so understood. Upon the defendant appearing in court and his identity not being denied, and it being admitted that the sentence of the court had not been executed, it was proper to make the necessary order for carrying the sentence into execution. There is therefore no error in the order appealed from. This opinion must be certified to the Superior Court of Haywood with the appropriate directions.

¶2 Per Curiam, Ordered accordingly,.

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