Boyce v. Odell Commission Co.

• Decision Date: 26 March 1901
• Docket Number: 9,910.
• Parties: BOYCE v. ODELL COMMISSION CO.
• Court: United States Circuit Court, District of Indiana

107 F. 58

BOYCE v. ODELL COMMISSION CO.

No. 9,910.

United States Circuit Court, D. Indiana.

March 26, 1901

Harvey Pickens, Cox & Kahn, C. L. Medsker, and Warner & Brady, for plaintiff.

Shay &amp Coga and Ryan & Ryan, for defendant.

BAKER District Judge.

This is an action to recover money alleged to have been lost in gambling on options. The complaint alleges that the defendant is indebted to the plaintiff in the sum of $3,449.14 for various sums of money had and received by the defendant of the plaintiff for his use and benefit that are due and unpaid, a bill of particulars of which is filed as part of the complaint; that each of said sums was paid by the plaintiff to the defendant within six months immediately preceding the commencement of the suit as and under a bet or wager made by the plaintiff with the defendant at the time of such payment and delivery in and on a certain game commonly called a 'bucket-shop game,' in futures, options, and margins, in which game bets and wagers are and were made upon transactions for fictitious delivery in the future upon options, and in which game the bets and wagers are called 'margins'; that said game was carried on and said bets and wagers were made in the form of pretended and fictitious contracts of sale or purchase for future delivery of stocks, grain, provisions, cotton, or other commodities with the intention and understanding on the part of both the defendant and the plaintiff that no stocks, grain, provisions, cotton, or other commodities should be delivered to or for the plaintiff or the defendant, but that settlement should be made between the plaintiff and the defendant by paying the difference between the market price at the time of settlement or at the time of the pretended maturity of the pretended and fictitious contracts of sale and the prices agreed between the plaintiff and defendant at the time such bet or wager was made; that each of said sums was paid and delivered, and each of said bets and wagers was made, and said game carried on, at Muncie, Ind.; that by reason of these facts a cause of action has accrued in favor of the plaintiff under and by virtue of the act of the general assembly of the state of Indiana approved June 11, 1852, entitled 'An act touching gaming contracts,' upon which act this action is founded.

The account filed with the complaint contains 47 items commencing on February 1, 1900, and ending on April 26, 1900, disclosing almost daily transactions. The defendant has moved the court to require the plaintiff to separate his complaint into paragraphs, and to number the same. If the motion is sustained, it would require the plaintiff to file a complaint containing 47 paragraphs. Rules of pleading are established to promote the ends of justice, and the observance of no technical rule ought to be so inflexible as to defeat this purpose. It is not claimed by counsel, nor, in the opinion of the court, could it be successfully claimed, that the defendant will be put to any disadvantage in trying the entire case on a single paragraph of complaint, while to require the plaintiff to prepare and file a complaint containing 47 paragraphs would impose needless labor without profit, and would prove a useless incumbrance of the records of the court. It is oftentimes a nice and difficult question to determine when a given state of facts may be pleaded in a single paragraph as a single cause of action, and when those facts must be set out in separate paragraphs. In the present case the court is of opinion that the facts stated in the complaint constitute one continuous transaction, which is properly pleaded in a single...