Commonwealth v. Watson

• Decision Date: 25 June 1891
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. WATSON.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

154 Mass. 135
27 N.E. 1003

COMMONWEALTH
v.
WATSON.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

June 25, 1891.

Exceptions from superior court, Suffolk county; JAMES M. BARKER, Judge.

A complaint was filed charging Thomas Watson with being in a pool-room and selling pools, in violation of St.Mass.1885, c. 342, § 1. Defendant moved to quash, for the reasons that no offense at common law or under the statute was charged, and that the selling of pools and the registering of bets is not charged as the business and employment of defendant. Motion overruled, and defendant excepted. On the trial the court refused to instruct the jury “that equal or unequal amounts risked against other or unequal amounts by or between one or more, to be determined by the result of an uncertain event or series of uncertain events, is not a pool. It is a wager,”-and instructed that “a pool is money that has been paid in by those who have bought a right in it, and which is to be paid over to the winner if he got the right number in a game of chance.” Defendant was convicted, and files exceptions.

[154 Mass. 139]A.E. Pillsbury, Atty. Gen., for the Commonwealth.

T.J. Morrison, for defendant.

HOLMES, J.

The motion to quash, and the exception to allowing the witness to refresh his memory from a memorandum made by him on the night of the transactions testified to, are disposed of by the foregoing case of Com. v. Clancy, 27 N.E.Rep. 1001. In the present case the defendant is indicted for being present in a room occupied, etc., and engaged in the business and employment of selling pools upon the result of a game of base-ball. It is unnecessary to state the evidence in detail. In the room were blackboards with rows of four names, understood by the witnesses to be names or abbreviations of names of base-ball clubs, each row being different from the others, and the rows being numbered from 1 to 16. One witnesses asked the defendant for No. 10, which read, “Brook., Pitts., Cleve., Phila.,” paid some money, and received a ticket numbered 10,456 in print, with 10 upon it in pencil. Afterwards he saw the defendant, and asked him if combination 10 had won, to which the defendant answered, “No.” The first exception is to allowing this witness to testify that combination 10 meant the four names in the row numbered 10, and that, as far as he knew, the names signified base-ball clubs. If the jury were not warranted in...