Matter of Application of Yee Kih Mah

In the justice’s court of Riverside township, in the county of Sacramento, the petitioner was charged with and convicted of a misdemeanor growing out of the violation by him of the legislative act entitled “An act to regulate the sale of poisons,” etc., and, claiming that the judgment of conviction is void because the court before which he was tried was without jurisdiction to try the action against him, he seeks his release from the custody of the sheriff of Sacramento County, by whom he is now being detained by authority of the said judgment of conviction and sentence thereupon imposed upon him, through the writ of habeas corpus.

In the outset it may be observed that, although the act of the violation of certain of whose provisions the petitioner was adjudged guilty prescribes penalties for the first and second convictions thereunder which are within the jurisdiction of justices’ or police courts to impose, yet, for a third conviction of the same person for the violation of the provisions thereof, the punishment prescribed is by imprisonment in the state prison for not less than one year and not more than five years. It hence follows that, where a person is charged with the…