Commonwealth v. Hanley

• Decision Date: 07 January 1886
• Citation: 140 Mass. 457,5 N.E. 468
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. HANLEY.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

140 Mass. 457

5 N.E. 468

COMMONWEALTH

v.HANLEY.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.

Filed January 7, 1886.

Complaint alleging the keeping, on January 10, 1885, of certain intoxicating liquors, with intent unlawfully to sell the same. At the trial in the superior court, before KNOWLTON, J., evidence was offered by the government tending to show that the defendant, on and before January 13, 1885, kept a certain saloon in Weymouth; that on said January 13th, three officers, who were witnesses, visited the saloon, which contained a bar, bottles, jugs, glasses, and a barrel of cider on tap, and, under a search warrant, the officers seized the cider. These officers also testified that, at the time, there were a number of glasses, jugs, etc., in the room, which smelt of whisky. The defendant admitted then that he had the cider there for sale. There was evidence that on two previous occasions certain intoxicated persons were seen upon the premises. The defendant put in evidence the records of the district court of East Norfolk, showing that the defendant was complained of for keeping and maintaining a certain tenement at Weymouth on October 1, 1884, and on divers days between that day and April 1, 1885, for the illegal sale, and illegal keeping for sale, of intoxicating liquor, the record showing that the defendant was tried and acquitted upon the merits of the complaint. He also introduced evidence tending to show that the witnesses in the present trial gave substantially the same testimony as at the trial of the other case in the district court. The defendant was not a witness at the present trial. The defendant asked the court to instruct the jury that the judgment of not guilty was a conclusive adjudication that the cider and the whisky were not kept by the defendant, on January 13th, for illegal sale; that they should not consider the evidence as to said day, place, and contents. But the court refused so to rule, and instructed the jury that said judgment was evidence competent for their consideration in favor of the defendant upon the question, but was not conclusive. The defendant's counsel argued to the jury that the defendant might be able to explain the keeping of the cider, the presence of the bottles, jugs, and glasses, which smelt of whisky, in some satisfactory way, and consistent with his innocence, and that the jury might draw such inferences, and might infer that the defendant could and would have, if he had become a...