Oleta O'COnnOr Yates v. United States

On July 26, 1955, this court affirmed a judgment under which Oleta O’Connor Yates was sentenced to one year's imprisonment for contempt of court. Yates v. United States, 9 Cir., 227 F.2d 851 . Our opinion was reversed, Yates v. United States, 355 U.S. 66 , 78 S.Ct. 128 , 2 L.Ed.2d 95 , the Supreme Court holding that the series of questions to which answer had been refused constituted one single contempt and not eleven separate contempts, each of which had been the subject of a separate charge. The case was remanded to the United States District Court for the Southern District of California.

Upon reconsidering the matter, the same trial judge resentenced Mrs. Yates to one year in jail. This judgment is now here and we are again asked to review the sentence. The case is here on its merits.

As we said in our original opinion, the sentence is severe, but, in our view, the sentence is within constitutional bounds and within the area reserved to the trial court’s discretion and not to be disturbed by this court.

We interpret the mandate of the Supreme Court’s opinion to be that the trial judge should take another look at some ameliorating circumstances which it listed. It issued no…