Sam v. State

Citations

• 21 Miss. 189

Syllabus

<p>The prisoner was indicted in the county of Issaquena in April, 1848; the county seat of which, by the act of 1846, was established at Tallula; but by an act passed in January, 1848, the board of police were authorized to remove the county seat to such point as they might select; the caption of the indictment stated that the court was holden at Tallula; the prisoner plead that “ Tallula, the place at which the court was holden, was not at that time the county seat of the county; ” to which plea the state demurred: Held, that the demurrer admitted that the court was not holden at the place designated by law, and that the indictment therefore should be quashed.</p> <p>On the trial of a slave for a murder committed in an adjoining county, from which the venue had been changed, two of the jurymen who joined in a verdict of “ guilty,” stated on their voir dire, the one that he had formed an opinion from the rumors he had heard; the other from the arguments of counsel to which he had listened on the previous day upon the trial of an accomplice of the prisoner for the same offence, and in which the witnesses were the same; each stated he had formed and expressed an opinion, one said his mind was clearly made up from rumor, each thought he could decide the case from testimony free from bias, but both thought it would require some testimony to remove the impression from their minds: Held, that under the general rule which requires the juror to be indifferent between the parties, these jurors were incompetent; there being nothing in the circumstances of the case to make a departure from the general rule necessary.</p> <p>The law on the point of what degree of opinion, as to the guilt or innocence of a prisoner, formed by a juryman called upon to try him, is a disqualification of such juror, considered at length ; and the conclusion reached that no rule of universal application could be laid down ; that the formation of an opinion by one who had heard all the testimony, was