## Facts

- The State of Montana filed a one-count information in the District Court of the First Judicial District, Lewis and Clark County, charging Daniel Marcus Shults with felony theft under § 94-6-302(1)(a), R.C.M. 1947.
- At Shults’s arraignment, the prosecutor moved to amend the information to charge unauthorized use of a motor vehicle under § 94-6-305, R.C.M. 1947, a misdemeanor treated as a lesser-included offense of the original theft charge.
- Shults was arraigned in district court on the amended misdemeanor charge, entered a guilty plea, and acknowledged the maximum penalty of up to six months in the county jail, a $500 fine, or both.
- The district court entered judgment and sentenced Shults to six months in the Lewis and Clark County jail.
- Shults later moved in district court to set aside the judgment of conviction and dismiss the amended information, arguing the district court lacked jurisdiction over the misdemeanor offense.
- The district court denied the motion, and Shults appealed to the Montana Supreme Court.

## Issues

1. Whether a Montana district court that had jurisdiction when a felony information was filed loses jurisdiction when the State amends the information to charge only a lesser-included misdemeanor.

## Decision

- The Montana Supreme Court held that the district court retained jurisdiction after the information was amended from a felony charge to a lesser-included misdemeanor charge.
- The Court affirmed the district court’s order denying Shults’s motion to set aside the conviction and dismiss the amended information.

## Legal Principles

- Montana district courts have original jurisdiction in criminal cases amounting to a felony under Article VII, Section 4 of the 1972 Montana Constitution.
- District courts also have statutory jurisdiction over “all public offenses not otherwise provided for” under § 95-301, R.C.M. 1947, while justice courts have only the original criminal jurisdiction granted by statute.
- When a district court’s criminal jurisdiction is properly invoked by the filing of a valid felony information, that jurisdiction is not removed merely because the State later amends the charging document to proceed only on a lesser-included misdemeanor arising from the same criminal matter.
- Treating the amended misdemeanor as part of the same criminal cause, the district court may accept a guilty plea and impose sentence on the lesser-included offense without transferring the case to an inferior court absent a constitutional or statutory command to do so.

## Conclusion

Because the district court’s jurisdiction was properly invoked when the State filed a felony theft information, the court retained authority to proceed after the State amended the information to charge only the lesser-included misdemeanor of unauthorized use of a motor vehicle, making Shults’s misdemeanor plea, conviction, and sentence valid.


State v. Shults, 544 P.2d 817 (1976)