State v. Kellogg

Citations

• 104 La. 580

Syllabus

<p>Syllabus.</p> <p>1. Every court has the power necessary to the exercise of the jurisdiction conferred upon it, and, in the absence of specific provisions of law upon the subject, may adopt such means as may be necessary for the correction of irregularities in the drawing of juries and such like matters.</p> <p>2. No special method is provided by law for the setting aside of the proceedings of a “jury commission” acting under the authority of Act 135 of 1898, in drawing a general venire, and, so far as the method is concerned, it is competent for the judge to set it aside by means of an order, made either in open court or in chambers and entered upon the minutes.</p> <p>3. Act 135 of 1898 differs from Act 44 of 1877, in that the former contemplates that all the members required by law to constitute the jury commission shall, at least, have been qualified before any official action is taken by the body as a whole.</p> <p>4. In any event, as the law contemplates that the jury commission shall consist of six persons, for a less number to act before the body had ever been completed by the appointment and qualification of another member is an irregularity which it is competent for the district judge to correct by setting aside the proceedings.</p> <p>5. A complaint that a person accused of crime was entitled to be tried by a jury selected from a venire drawn by a majority of the jury commission before the other members had qualified, when no fraud or specific injury is charged, is without merit.</p> <p>O. It is competent 1'or the trial judge to order talesmen from portions of the parish remote from the scene of the homicide, and the mere recital, in a b'H of exceptions, that there is antagonism between the two sections of the parish will not affect the validity of such order, when it is not made to appear in what way such antagonism will be prejudicial to the defendant in the matter of his trial.</p> <p>7. A juror, who, upon .his voir dire, says “I have been thinking,