Hill v. Taylor

• Decision Date: 06 June 1883
• Citation: 50 Mich. 549,15 N.W. 899
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: HILL v. TAYLOR.

15 N.W. 899

50 Mich. 549

HILL v. TAYLOR.

Supreme Court of Michigan

June 6, 1883

A criminal prosecution for embezzlement cannot be prosecuted outside of the county where the offense was perpetrated whether actually or in contemplation of law; and a warrant issued by a justice of some other county for the arrest of a person charged therewith, is invalid on its face.

Actual knowledge of the law is not so conclusively presumed as to charge with malice one who is acting in reliance on what he reasonably believes to be lawful; and if his act is really unlawful, he cannot be held to the same measure of liability as if he did it in defiance of law.

One who makes a criminal complaint without sufficient cause, ought not to be put on the footing of an intentional law-breaker if he had the co-operation of the regular criminal authorities, unless it appears that he knew he was acting unlawfully.

A person making complaint can only be liable for false imprisonment where the officer making the arrest is liable though his animus may aggravate his liability. But his animus will not make him liable if his purpose is not carried out unless, perhaps, where he seeks to serve the warrant himself.

An arrest is not made where the officer purporting to make it merely informs the person to be arrested of his business, and neither takes him into custody nor in any way deprives him of freedom of action.

An action for false imprisonment will not lie where the plaintiff has not been arrested; and though his manual seizure is not necessary to an arrest, there must be some sort of personal coercion.

The superior court of Detroit has jurisdiction of an action for false imprisonment, if the plaintiff lives in Detroit, and the action complained of as an arrest was made in that city.

Error to superior court of Detroit.

Griffin, Dickinson, Thurber & Hosmer, for plaintiff.

David B. Taylor, in pro. per., defendant and appellant.

CAMPBELL J.

Hill prosecuted Taylor for false imprisonment in being concerned in an unlawful arrest, and obtained a judgment against him for damages, which is brought up on writ of error.

The proceeding under which he claims to have been arrested was on a complaint made before a justice of the peace in Washtenaw, for an alleged embezzlement in Wayne county. This action was based on section 7605 of the Compiled Laws, which authorizes embezzlement by various public agents, or by private agents under written instructions or agreements as to disposal of property, to be prosecuted in the county where the complainant's principal place of business may be.

Although there are some cases where by the rules of law that might be deemed the locus delicti, it cannot be seriously claimed that the prosecution can be had in a county where the crime was not actually or in contemplation of law perpetrated. The constitutional guaranty on this subject is too plain to be controverted. Swart v. Kimball, 43 Mich. 444; [S.C. 5 N.W. 635.] And the warrant in this case was on its face invalid as issued for an offense beyond the jurisdiction of the justice who issued it.

But we think the court below, while properly holding it void, went too far in holding that if the warrant was illegal the defendant would be liable substantially to the same extent whether he believed it valid or not. It is undoubtedly true that every one is bound to know the law, and is liable for actual damages for his trespass, though honestly committed. But there is no such conclusive presumption of an actual knowledge of the law as...