State v. James

(concurring in the result) .

I concur in reversing this case because the appellant could not be tried by an eight-man jury. His crime was that of murder in the first degree, and the only penalty provided by law for conviction thereof without recommendation of leniency by the jury and a concurrence therein by the trial judge is death.1

To remove the penalty provided by law is to cast doubt upon the statute as it relates to murder in the first degree. The law is set out in 21 Am.Jur.2d, Criminal Law, § 16, as follows:. [A] criminal statute is of no force or effect if no penalty whatever is…