People ex rel. Gow v. Bingham

The undisputed facts in this case are these: On the 21st of November, 1907, William Gow had been indicted by a grand jury in the County Court of Kings county, charged with the crimes of grand larceny and forgery. So far as appears, he had never before been accused nor even suspected of any crime. He appeared at the court-house where the County-Court was in session on the day named, and went to the office of the district attorney of the county, and there acknowledged his readiness to appear and plead to the said indictments and arrange for the giving of bail necessary to secure his release from custody pending trial. While waiting in the district attorney’s office to permit arrangements between the district attorney and

This application is made for a peremptory writ of mandamus to compel the officials constituting the police department of the city of New York and those persons having the custody and control of the said photographs, records and impressions to destroy the same, as having been unlawfully taken and as being retained without authority of law.

Two questions present themselves upon this application:

First. Was the act of the officers of the police department in compelling the petitioner to submit to having his photograph taken and those measurements and imprints made, a lawful or an unlawful act ?

There are certain rights pertaining to mankind, which have their origin independent of any express provision of law, and which are termed “ natural rights.” One of these is the right of personal liberty. This includes, not only absolute freedom to every one to go where and when he pleases, but the right to preserve his person inviolate from attack by any other person. This right to one’s person may be said to be a right of complete immunity; to be let alone. Cooley Torts (3d ed.), 33. The inviolability of the person is as much invaded by a compulsory stripping and exposure, as by a blow. Union Pacific R. R. Co. v. Bottsford, 141 U. S. 250 ; McQuigan v. D. L. & W. R. R. Co., 129 N. Y. 50 . So sacred is this right in its character, that the People of the State, speaking in the most solemn form, namely, through the State Constitution, have declared that no person shall be deprived of any of his rights unless by the law of the land or the judgment of his peers. N. Y. State Const., art. 1, § 1. ISTor shall he be deprived of his liberty without due process of law. Ibid., art. 1, § 6. These constitutional provisions are not the sources of the right; they are in the nature of a shield against any unwarrantable interference with such rights by any department of the government, executive, legislative or judicial. But, when one becomes a member of a community, this absolute right confirmed by constitutional provisions of necessity yields to another and higher right.. The absolute freedom from restraint which the individual has as a natural right yields to the necessities of the public welfare, when such public welfare demands that, for its sake, this right be temporarily impaired. It is in accordance with the demand of this necessity that temporary restraint of a person accused of crime, until such time as the accusation can be determined to be false or well founded, finds the authority for its existence. But this right of temporary restraint

The act of declaring what temporary invasions of the natural rights of liberty and personal immunity are necessary in the exercise of police power for the common welfare of the community is solely a legislative act. 1 Tied. State & Federal Control, § 2.

It is necessary, therefore, for the respondents in this case to show, in the first place, legislative authority for the acts complained of. If such authority is shown, a further question will arise, whether that act was in violation of constitutional provisions, or a legitimate exercise of the police power. If no such authority is shown, the latter inquiry need not be pursued. Ho statute has been found which, in express terms, authorizes any member of the police force of this city to deprive any person of his liberty of action or invade his right of personal immunity to the extent of requiring him to submit to having his photograph taken, and measurements and impressions of his body made, for the purpose of preserving them in the criminal records of that department, simply because such person has been indicted, charged with a criminal offense. The police depart

By section 272 of the charter, the police commissioner is required “to make such rules, orders and regulations,” as may be reasonably necessary to effect a prompt and efficient exercise of all powers conferred upon him by law. But if no power is conferred upon him by law in this regard, any rule which he may promulgate respecting the same is utterly void. The exercise of any such extreme police power as is here contended for is contrary to the spirit of Anglo-Saxon liberty. It is a principle of the common law which has been reinforced by statutory provisions (Code Crim. Pro., § 389), that every person is presumed to be innocent until the contrary be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. That presumption survives the finding of an indictment, arrest, arraignment and the impanelling of a petit jury for the trial of the issue. It continues during the introduction of evidence upon the trial, the summing up of counsel, the charge of the court, and until the jury, by its verdict of

To hold that the vague and indefinite provisions of the charter above referred to authorize the conduct of the police department which is here criticised would require us to hold that the express provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure above referred to with regard to the arrest and detention of a prisoner (Code Crim. Pro., §§ 303, 165, 172) were repealed by implication. The law does not favor repeal by implication of the express provisions of a statute. 1 Lewis Suth. Stat. Const. 465.

It is only when there is such manifest and total repugnance between the earlier and later statutes that the two enactments cannot stand together that such repeal will be inferred. Not only does such repugnance not exist in this case, but the construction contended for by the police department is in direct conflict with the provisions of the charter itself, which makes it the duty of every member of the police force, under the penalty of a fine or dismissal from the force, immediately upon an arrest to convey the offender, not to police headquarters to be photographed and measured, but “ before the nearest sitting magistrate, that he may be dealt with according to law.” Laws of 1901, chap. 466, § 338.

The remaining statute above referred to, which has been cited in support-of the contention of the respondents, provides that, “ upon the determination of a criminal action or proceeding against a person in favor of such person, every photograph of such person and photographic plate or proof taken or made of such person while such action or proceeding is pending, by direction or authority of any police officer, peace officer, or any member of any police department, and all duplicates and copies thereof, shall be returned on demand to such person by the police officer, peace officer, or member of any police department

The reason which induced the Legislature to pass this act may undoubtedly be found in the determination of the Court of Appeals in the Molineux case. Matter of Molineux v. Collins, 177 N. Y. 395 . In that case the relator had been convicted of the crime of murder in the first degree, and sentenced to death. Thereafter, in pursuance of an express statute, he had been photographed and measured. Subsequently it was determined that the judgment of conviction was erroneous, and it was reversed; and upon a new trial he was acquitted. In the proceeding above referred to, he sought to compel the return to him or the destruction of the photographs and plates. The court held that, inasmuch as at the time that the photograph was taken it was taken in pursuance of an express authority of statute relating to presons who had been convicted of crime and, inasmuch as the statute provided no relief for those whose conviction might subsequently be adjudged erroneous, the appeal for relief must be made to the Legislature and not to the court. The act in question went further than the necessities of the case demanded. It would have been entirely sufficient to have provided that, where such a photograph had been taken in pursuance of any express provision of law, and a criminal action against the subject of the picture, although he might have been at one time and before the picture was taken convicted of crime, was ultimately determined in his favor, such photograph should be destroyed.

It could hardly be deemed possible that the Legislature intended to make that which was unlawful when it was done a lawful act, by simply providing that the result of that unlawful act should under certain contingencies be destroyed.

In the case of persons actually convicted of crime and sentenced to the State prisons, or the penitentiaries of the State, or to the Hew York State Reformatory at Elmira, the Legis

It is not conceivable that the law making power, which proceeded so carefully and by express enactments with reference to the cases of persons convicted of crime, should have intended, by vague and indefinite provisions such as the one last above referred to, to affect the sacred rights of persons presumed to be entirely innocent of any crime. Ho case has been cited in this State attempting to sustain the action of the police authorities in this regard. Only two have been called to my attention where the question has been considered, and I have been unable to find any others. People ex rel. Joyce v. York, 27 Misc. Rep. 658 ; Owen v. Partridge, 40 id. 415. In the first of these, the relator had been actually convicted. In the second the court carefully refrained from passing on the question of the right of the police department in cases where conviction had not been had. It is perfectly clear, therefore, that there is no statutory authority justifying the acts of the police department which are here attacked. The real ground for their action, as it appears from the moving papers herein, is a custom of the police department, which has existed for a considerable period of time, of adding to the photographs and measurements of convicted criminals, taken under the statutes above referred to, the photographs and measurements, not of every person arrested, but only of those particular persons that, in the wisdom of the police officials, they deemed desirable to have in their collection; and this custom is indirectly countenanced by a rule of the department to the effect that “ likenesses of persons collected for the use of the detective bureau shall be privately kept in a gallery for the official use of the police force as an aid to the prevention and detection of crime, and shall not be exhibited to any person unless such person is accompanied by an officer of the depart

Notwithstanding this, after careful examination, I am convinced that the relator has mistaken his remedy. In the absence of special statutory authority, a writ of mandamus only lies to compel one to do what ought to be done in the discharge of a

In the Rash case, it appeared that the seal of a corporation had been improperly affixed to the register of shareholders, and an application was made for a writ of mandamus to compel the removal of said seal. Lord Campbell said: “ We grant it (mandamus) when that has not been done which the statute orders to be done, but not for the purpose of undoing what has been done.” It might be urged that it was the duty of the police department to keep a correct record of persons convicted of crime and not to confuse and embarrass that record with the pictures and measurements of persons presumed to be innocent. The answer to such argument is that there is no express statutory duty imposed upon the police department in this city to keep a record even of those persons convicted of crime. But if there had been, and by inadvertence or design there had been included in that record the picture and history or the impressions of persons not properly included therein, in the absence of express statutory authority the court could not by mandamus compel the correction of such error.

A register of deeds may be compelled to record a deed which has been properly executed and acknowledged, if he refuses so to do. I apprehend, however, that if through inadvertence or design he recorded a deed improperly acknowledged, or one upon which the signature was forged, he could not be compelled by mandamus to cancel such record, although the instrument was improperly recorded.

The case of Dental Society v. Jacobs, supra, seems to be precisely in point. In that case it appeared that, by the Public Health Law (Laws of 1893, chap. 661, §§ 161, 162, as amd. by Laws of 1895, chap, 626) it was the duty of every person prac

Subsequently to the passage of the act, and on the 19th of August, 1895, one William E. Walker presented an affidavit in which he stated that his legal authority for practicing dentistry within thisxState was conferred upon him by diploma from the Wisconsin Dental College. It appeared that the Wisconsin. Dental College was not a registered dental school, and it was claimed that the said college sold its diplomas and that the said Walker had purchased the diploma from said college for the sum of fifty dollars. The State Dental Society took the matter up and sought by mandamus to compel the county clerk to cancel, erase and expunge from the records in his office the name of the said Walker on the book of registry of dentists and to remove said affidavit from the files. The argument was there made that public interests demand that a true register of dentists be kept and that, in discharging this public duty, the county clerk could be compelled to remove from said register the names of all persons improperly there. The court held that, notwithstanding the act of the county clerk in receiving Walker’s affidavit and entering his name on the register was wholly without authority of law, yet there was no statutory duty im

The fact that, in the Civil Service Law, the Legislature has deemed it necessary to expressly provide that, in the provisions relating to the rights of preference to appointment conferred upon veterans and the provisions relating to the removal of veterans from positions in the public service, the injured party should have a remedy by mandamus for refusing to allow a preference, or to undo an unlawful act of removal (Laws of 1899, chap. 370, §§ 20, 21), would seem to indicate that, but for such express statutory authority, the right to this remedy would not exist.

Under the same law it was held, with regard to a person claiming a privilege against removal by reason of being an exempt fireman, at a time when the remedy by mandamus had not been extended to them, that such relief was unavailable. People ex rel. Cochran v. Tracy, 35 App. Div. 265 .

It is with great regret that I have been compelled to come to the conclusion that I cannot afford the relator relief in this form of proceeding. It seems highly probable, however, that by voluntary action the police department will gladly undo the wrong that has been done. It is scarcely conceivable that a department of the city government, whose acts are not only unlawful but criminal in character, should hesitate to undo such acts when their attention is called to the character of them. It is

The application must be denied, but without costs.

Application denied, without costs.