Disharoon v. State

• Decision Date: 27 February 1895
• Parties: DISHAROON v. STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

22 S.E. 698

95 Ga. 351

DISHAROON v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Georgia

February 27, 1895

Syllabus by the Court.

1. An indictment which charges that a married man had sexual intercourse with an unmarried woman, with her consent, is a good indictment against him for adultery and fornication although it denominates the crime "seduction," and contains allegations ineffectually undertaking to set forth that offense.

2. The evidence fully warranted the verdict for adultery and fornication, and there was no error in denying a new trial.

Error from superior court, Dawson county; George F. Gober, Judge.

James M. Disharoon was convicted of adultery, and brings error. Affirmed.

R. P Lattner, Thos. Hutcheson, and H. H. Perry, for plaintiff in error.

Geo. R. Brown, Sol. Gen., for the State.

ATKINSON J.

In the indictment against the defendant the offense was designated specifically as that of seduction. The indictment charged the act of sexual intercourse between the accused and an unmarried woman; alleged that she, previous thereto, was a virtuous female, and that her consent for the defendant to have carnal knowledge of her person was induced by deceitful means and artful practices, and by false and fraudulent means; that the female alleged to have been seduced was of tender years, being only 13 years of age, and that this defendant, being himself a married man, did then and there represent to her that he loved her, and did then and there win her confidence and affection; that he represented to her that it would not be wrong to yield to his lustful embraces, and it would not be wrong to allow him to have carnal knowledge of her person, that it would not hurt or injure her character, and that, if she would consent to sexual intercourse with him, he would leave his wife and take her; that she being young and inexperienced, having implicit confidence in the defendant, and believing the representations he made to her were true that it would not be wrong, that it would not injure her character, she then and there yielded to his lustful embraces, and allowed him to have carnal knowledge of her person. These representations by the defendant were alleged to have been false and fraudulent, and the deceitful means and artful practices resorted to to induce her consent.

To justify a conviction for the offense of seduction the consent of the female seduced must have been induced either by persuasion and promises of marriage on by other false and fraudulent means. It is not insisted in this case that the consent of this female was induced by persuasion and promises of marriage. In order to justify a conviction upon persuasion or solicitation to the criminal act, it must appear that such persuasion or solicitation was coupled with the promise of marriage, and that the promise of marriage established such a relation between the parties as that the female was induced under the influence thereof, and upon expectation of its realization, more readily than otherwise she would have been, to yield to the persuasion or solicitations of the seducer. A consent to the act of sexual intercourse, based upon a promise of marriage as a consideration moving to the female alleged to have been seduced, and upon the faith of which she consents to the sexual act, takes the whole transaction out of the definition of seduction and makes it purely meretricious; the relation thus established being wholly inconsistent with the idea of that virtuous consent involved in the commission of the offense of seduction. Solicitations, however earnest, coupled with a promise of marriage, whereunder a woman undertakes to sell her person in consideration of a promise of marriage, do not make it a case of seduction. To constitute a promise of marriage the incriminating element in a case of seduction the woman must believe it to be a bona fide promise, and she must yield to the solicitations of her pretended lover, and not merely submit to the demands of her purchaser. The fraudulent means resorted to must be such as mislead the party upon whom they are practiced, and induce her, upon a misapprehension of the true state of affairs, to yield to the lustful embraces of the man who thereby induces her consent. A fair illustration of this may be...