Commonwealth v. Ellis
| Decision Date | 28 November 1893 |
| Citation | 160 Mass. 165,35 N.E. 773 |
| Parties | COMMONWEALTH v. ELLIS. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Hosea M. Knowlton, for the Commonwealth.
A.E. Bragg, for defendant.
This is a complaint, under St.1885, c. 176, charging the defendant with the offense of unreasonably neglecting to provide for the support of his minor child. At the trial in the superior court, the defense was that the child was not the child of the defendant, but was a bastard child of the defendant's wife. To meet this defense, the government put in evidence a record of the second district court of Bristol, showing a prior conviction and sentence of the defendant, under the same statute, for unreasonably neglecting to support the same child. The presiding justice ruled, as matter of law, that the record of the conviction and sentence was conclusive evidence that the paternity of the child was determined, and that the defendant was estopped to set up the illegitimacy of the child as a defense. The correctness of this ruling is the only question before us.
The question of the paternity of the child was necessarily involved in the prior conviction of the defendant. That fact having been determined, it cannot again be litigated between the same parties, unless a different rule applies to criminal proceedings from that which obtains in civil proceedings. See Sly v. Hunt, 159 Mass. 151, 34 N.E. 187, and cases cited. It is well settled that the rule is the same in both classes of cases. Thus, in Com. v. Evans, 101 Mass. 25, it was held, on the trial of an indictment for manslaughter, that the record of a conviction of the defendant for the assault which caused the death was conclusive evidence that the assault was unjustifiable. So, in Com. v. Feldman, 131 Mass. 588, where the defendant was indicted for an assault upon a public officer, committed while the defendant was under arrest for drunkenness, it was held that a record of a conviction and sentence of the defendant for drunkenness at the time of his arrest was conclusive evidence of that fact. Exceptions overruled.
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...In appropriate circumstances that rule is applicable to criminal adjudications. Commonwealth v. Evans, 101 Mass. 25;Commonwealth v. Ellis, 160 Mass. 165, 35 N.E. 773;Commonwealth v. Perry, 248 Mass. 19, 28, 29, 142 N.E. 840. That principle is not available to the defendant. The direction of......
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...v. DeAngelo (3d Cir.1943) 138 F.2d 466) and state courts (Compare, e.g., Commonwealth v. Evans (1869) 101 Mass. 25; Commonwealth v. Ellis (1892) 160 Mass. 165, 35 N.E. 773; State v. Sargood (1907) 80 Vt. 412, 68 Atl. 51 [allowing preclusion] with People v. Goss (1993) 200 Mich.App. 9, 503 N......
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