People v. Sheriff of New York

By the Court, Ingraham, J.

The relator applied, by petition, for a habeas corpus, and on the return of the writ was brought before this court by the sheriff. The sheriff returns that he holds the prisoner by virtue of and according to the tenor, manner and command of a certain commitment for an alleged contempt, a copy of which was thereto annexed.

By such commitment it appears that in an action pending in the court of common pleas, for the recovery of a lot of land in the city of New York, one Betz had been examined as a witness on the trial thereof; that he was defending the action *623as the…