Lanthrop v. Commonwealth

<p>The prisoner was indicted at the November term 1849. of the Circuit court of the town of Petersburg, for stealing a horse. After he had been arraigned and had pleaded not guilty, and the jury had been sworn on the issue joined, the prisoner, by his counsel, moved the Court to instruct the clerk, in making his charge to the jury, that the act of the 30th of January 1819, 1 Rev. Code, ch. 152, p. 575, in relation to horse stealing, was repealed by the 2d section of the 27th chapter of the act of the 14th March 1848, entitled “An act to reduce into one the several acts concerning crimes and punishments, and proceedings in criminal casesand that the punishment for horse stealing, as the law then stood, was that prescribed by the 15th section of said act, for the punishment of grand larceny; and he also moved the Court so to instruct the jury. But the Court held that the law for the punishment of the crime of horse stealing, as it stood before the passage of said act of the 14th of March 1848, was not changed by that act, so far as regards the punishment for the offence, which he held was confinement in the penitentiary for a period not less than five nor more than ten years. And the clerk charged the jury accordingly. To this opinion of the Court, the prisoner excepted.</p> <p>The jury found the prisoner guilty, and fixed the term of his imprisonment in the penitentiary at five years; and the Judge sentenced him accordingly. Whereupon he applied to this Court for a writ of error, which was awarded.</p>