(Download) "Burnett v. Commonwealth" by Supreme Court of Kentucky " eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Burnett v. Commonwealth
- Author : Supreme Court of Kentucky
- Release Date : January 13, 2000
- Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 62 KB
Description
Prosecutions for malfeasance of office as defined by La.R.S. 14:134(1) and 14:134(2) presuppose the existence of "a statute or provision of the law which delineates an affirmative duty upon the official." State v. Perez, 464 So.2d 737, 741 (La. 1985). This duty "must be expressly imposed by law upon the official because the official is entitled to know exactly what conduct is expected of him in his official capacity and what conduct will subject him to criminal charges." Id. In this prosecution of the former Justice of the Peace for the Eighth Ward in St. Tammany Parish on two counts of malfeasance, the court of appeal reversed the defendants conviction on the count charging him with failure to remit litter fines to the appropriate governing authority from January 1, 1991 to December 31, 1993, on grounds that "even assuming defendant had a duty to remit some or all of the litter fines to the parish, no time for the performance of this duty was provided by law." State v. Schwehm, 97-1544, p. 5 (La.App. 1st Cir. 5/15/98), 713 So.2d 697, 701. In the absence of such an express provision, and notwithstanding the appeal of the "common sense" proposition "that a requirement of reasonable promptness is implicit in the duty to remit," the court of appeal concluded that "defendants failure to remit the litter fines to the parish [did] not constitute the criminal offense of malfeasance in office." Schwehm, 97-1544 at 6, 713 So.2d at 701. We granted the states application for review of that decision because the evidence at trial fully supported a finding that, as the prosecution argued to jurors at trial, the defendant had intentionally refused to perform the duty imposed on him by law not only by failing to remit the fines within the three-year period or within any implicit reasonable period of time but also by converting the fines to his own use. The defendants conduct has been unlawful in this state for well over a century, see 1855 La. Acts 120, § 80 (proscribing the embezzlement or conversion to his own use by a public official of funds for which he had responsibility of collecting on behalf of any parish or incorporated city), and it remains punishable today under La.R.S. 14:134. We therefore reverse the decision below.