Com. v. Miller

• Decision Date: 11 November 1889
• Citation: 22 N.E. 434,150 Mass. 69
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. MILLER et al.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

150 Mass. 69

22 N.E. 434

COMMONWEALTH v. MILLER et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Bristol.

November 11, 1889

COUNSEL

J. Brown, for defendant Miller.

A.J Waterman, Atty. Gen., and H.C. Bliss, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the Commonwealth.

OPINION

C ALLEN, J.

For the purposes of this case we are content to assume, without discussion, that an indictment should be quashed which should charge B. with having received stolen goods at one time, and A. and B. with having received other stolen goods at a different time. But the complaint in the present case was proper. It charged both defendants jointly, in two counts with having received different stolen goods at different times. There was no legal objection to the complaint, and none was taken. Com. v. Hills, 10 Cush. 530; Edgerton v. Com., 5 Allen, 514; Com v. Sullivan, 104 Mass. 552; Com. v. Darling, 129 Mass. 112. It is true that Miller, having been acquitted on the first count, stood at the trial in the superior court charged in only one count, and with only one offense, while Elderkin was charged in two counts with two different offenses. But the same result would have happened if the original prosecution had been by indictment, and the jury had acquitted Miller on the first count, and disagreed upon all the rest of the charges. When such a state of things is found to exist the defendant thus partly acquitted has no absolute legal right to a separate trial. This is a matter of discretion. It often happens that evidence which is admissible and perhaps cogent as against one defendant is incompetent as to another. Where it can be anticipated at the outset that there will be such evidence, the court will sometimes, in exceptional cases, and in the exercise of its discretion, grant separate trials, but the usual course is the other way. Com. v. James, 99 Mass. 438; Com. v. Thompson, 108 Mass. 461; Com. v. Robinson, 1 Gray, 555. In like manner, in civil cases, the court has power, in its discretion, to consolidate several actions, and try them together, though the parties may not be altogether the same, and though some of the evidence may not be applicable to all of the cases. Springfield v. Sleeper, 115 Mass. 587; Burt v. Wigglesworth, 117 Mass. 302; Kimball v. Thompson, 4 Cush. 441; Witherlee v. Insurance Co., 24 Pick. 67. It has to be assumed that in civil and criminal cases the jury will ordinarily be able to pass upon each case or each...