Commonwealth v. Gray
Decision Date | 06 September 1880 |
Citation | 129 Mass. 474 |
Parties | Commonwealth v. Lewis J. Gray |
Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Suffolk. Indictment for adultery with Elizabeth Kirwan.
At the trial in the Superior Court, before Bacon, J., the government offered evidence tending to show that the defendant and Elizabeth Kirwan occupied a room in a lodging-house in Boston as husband and wife, for a period of about four weeks.
The defendant offered evidence to show that the general character of Elizabeth Kirwan for chastity was good. The government objected to the evidence; and the judge excluded it.
The jury returned a verdict of guilty; and the defendant alleged exceptions.
Exceptions sustained.
G. W Searle & J. H. Cotton, for the defendant.
G Marston, Attorney General, for the Commonwealth.
Evidence which tends directly to prove or disprove the issue which the pleadings in any case present is always competent. It may have more or less weight, but it is the right of the party offering it to have it considered by the jury. It rarely, however, happens, in the trial of a cause, that such evidence only is offered. This is especially true in every case in which the party having the burden of proof attempts to sustain it wholly by circumstantial evidence. In such case, every circumstance which is admitted in evidence becomes material, and may be controverted. Nor is the materiality of facts, not bearing directly upon the issue, confined to circumstances introduced upon issues to be sustained wholly by circumstantial evidence. It rarely happens, and in a contested case perhaps never happens, that some fact, in its character unimportant, and having no bearing upon the issue on trial, does not become material, so that evidence in relation to it cannot be rejected. The more common illustrations of this are perhaps time, place, or both time and place. In addition to these, collateral questions often arise which make facts material which otherwise are wholly unimportant. In criminal cases especially, the question of motive or provocation may become material, and be the subject of testimony. While, in a criminal case, the identity of the party charged with the one on trial is always material, yet other questions of identity may constantly arise, upon which testimony becomes material and competent, which otherwise would be wholly unimportant. Questions of character or reputation may often become material, and such questions may relate to a building, or a locality, as well as to an individual. It is sometimes said, but not with entire accuracy, that it rests with the presiding judge in his discretion to admit or reject evidence, as he shall judge it to be or not to be too remote. It often happens that the competency of evidence may depend upon the existence of some other fact; whether such fact exists is a preliminary question, to be decided by the presiding judge. His decision as to such fact cannot be revised; but his ruling as matter of law that such fact renders the evidence competent or incompetent is the subject of revision; and upon examination, in all those cases in which the admission of the evidence is said to rest in the discretion of the presiding judge, we think it will be found that it is the decision of a preliminary fact upon which the finding of the judge is conclusive, and which fact determines the competency of the evidence. See Foster v. Mackay, 7 Met. 531; Commonwealth v. Mullins, 2 Allen 295; Kendall v. May, 10 Allen 59; Commonwealth v. Morrell, 99 Mass. 542; O'Connor v. Hallinan, 103 Mass. 547.
In this case, the precise question presented by the...
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