In Re Woofter

On the eighth day of October, 1929, an information was filed in the Superior Court of the County of Butte, charging the prisoner with the crime of escape, in that the petitioner, on or about the twenty-seventh day of March, 1929, in the county of Butte, who had theretofore been committed to the state prison at San Quentin, for a term less than life, did escape while engaged in road work at Camp 17, in Butte County, in violation of section 106 of the Penal Code. After trial the petitioner was on the sixteenth day of October, 1929, found guilty and sentenced to the state prison at Folsom.

Upon this application the petitioner contends that at the time of his trial, and on the date of pronouncing judgment and sentence, there was no section of the Penal Code providing for the punishment of such an offender in the state prison. This contention is based, first, upon the act of the legislature approved June 19, 1929, purporting to repeal sections 18, 18a and 1588 of the Penal Code.

The further contention is made that the offense of which the petitioner is found guilty, and for which he was sentenced, is only a misdemeanor, in that no penalty was provided by the codes for the offense of…