CAPIAS PRO¹ FINE, practice, crim. law. The name of a writ² which issues against a defendant³ who has been fined, and who does not discharge it according to the judgment⁴. This writ commands the sheriff to arrest the defendant and commit him to prison, there to remain till he pay the fine, or be otherwise discharged according to law.

CAPIAS UTLAGATUM English practice. A capias utlagatum is general or special; the former against the person only, the latter against the person, lands and goods.

2. This writ issues upon the judgment of outlawry⁵ being returned by the sheriff upon the exigent, and it takes its name from the words of the mandatory⁶ part of the writ, which states the defendant being outlawed⁷ utlagatum, which word comes from the Saxon utlagh, Latinized utlagatus, and signifies bannitus, extra legem. Cowel.

3. The general writ of capias utlagatum commands the sheriff to take the defendant, so that he have him before the king on a general return day, wheresoever, &c., to do and receive what the court shall consider of him.

4. The special capias utlagatum, like the general writ, commands the sheriff to take the defendant. The defendant is discharged upon an attorney's undertaking⁸, or upon giving bond to the sheriff, in the same manner as when the writ is general. But the special writ also commands the sheriff to inquire by a jury, of the defendant's goods and lands, to extend and appraise⁹ the same, and to take them in the king's hands and safely keep them, so that he may answer to the king for the value and issue's of the same. 2 Arch. Pr. 161. See Outlawry.

CAPIAS IN WITHERNAM, practice. A writ issued after a return of elongata or eloigned has been made to a writ of retorno habendo, commanding the sheriff to take so many of the distrainer's goods by way of reprisal¹⁰, as will equal the goods mentioned in the retorno habendo. 2 Inst. 140; F. N. B. 68; and see form in 2 Sell. Pr. 169.

CAPIATUR, pro fine. The name of a writ which was issued to levy¹¹ a fine due to the king. Bac. Ab. Fines and Amercements, in prin. See Judgment of Capiatur.

CAPITA, or PER CAPITA. By heads. An expression of frequent occurrence in laws regulating the distribution of the estates of persons dying intestate. When all the persons entitled to shares in the distribution are of the same degree of kindred to the deceased person, (e.g. when all are grandchildren,) and claim directly from him in their own right and not through an intermediate relation, they take per capita, that is, equal shares, or share and share alike. But when they are of different degrees of kindred, (e. g. some tho children, others the grandchildren or the great grandchildren of the, deceased,) those more remote take er stirpem or per stirpes, that is, they take respectively the shares their parents (or other relation standing¹² in the same degree with them of the surviving kindred entitled) who are in the nearest degree of kindred to the intestate,) would have taken had they respectively survived the intestate. Reeves' Law of Descent, Introd. xxvii.; also 1 Rop. on Leg. 126, 130. See Per Capita; Per Stirpes; Stirpes;