Commonwealth v. Boynton
| Decision Date | 25 November 1874 |
| Parties | Commonwealth v. Worcester E. Boynton |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Essex. Indictment under the Gen. Sts. c. 165, § 9, charging that the defendant, at a time and place certain "maliciously and without lawful justification, did use a certain instrument, the name of which instrument is to the jurors aforesaid unknown, which said instrument, the said Boynton then and there had and held, by then and there forcing and thrusting the instrument aforesaid into the body and womb of one Georgiana Goff, the said Goff being then and there pregnant with child, with intent thereby, then and there, to cause and procure the miscarriage of the said Goff." Before the jury were sworn, the defendant filed the following motion to quash: This motion was overruled.
The government introduced as a witness Georgiana Goff, who testified substantially to the facts charged, and that she hired and procured the defendant to perform the operation set forth in the indictment. There was other evidence on the part of the prosecution which the government contended corroborated the witness Goff on material points, but which the defendant contended was not such corroboration.
The defendant asked the judge to instruct the jury that "upon the statement of the witness Goff, she was an accomplice in the commission of the crime she describes, and unless her evidence is corroborated in material matters, it is unsafe for a jury to convict upon it, because of its corrupt and suspicious source; and under such circumstances courts deem it their duty to advise the jury to acquit." The judge declined to give this instruction as requested; but instructed the jury upon this point that: "As the witness Goff testified that the defendant did the acts complained of at her request and upon her employment, the jury should carefully consider her connection with those acts in reference to her testimony, and should scrutinize her statements with peculiar care on that account."
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