Huffman v. State
| Decision Date | 25 June 1915 |
| Docket Number | No. 22619.,22619. |
| Citation | 183 Ind. 698,109 N.E. 401 |
| Parties | HUFFMAN v. STATE. |
| Court | Indiana Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from Circuit Court, Vigo County; Felix Blankenbaker, Special Judge.
William Huffman was convicted of an offense under the election laws. From an order striking out his plea in abatement and his motion to quash, he appeals. Affirmed.
For dissenting opinion, see 109 N.E. 748.
Albert J. Kelley, Louis D. Leveque, and Hamill, Hickey & Evans, all of Terre Haute, for appellant. Thomas M. Honan, of Seymour, Thomas H. Branaman, of Brownstown, and Joseph Roach, of Terre Haute, for appellee.
Appellant was prosecuted and convicted in the Vigo circuit court upon an indictment returned to such court on the 24th day of January, 1914. Before pleading generally to the indictment, appellant filed a plea in abatement, which, upon motion of the state, was stricken from the files of the court. Appellant then filed a motion to quash the indictment, which was overruled. The exceptions of appellant to these rulings raise the only questions which are presented on appeal.
The plea in abatement thus filed, as shown by the record, covered 123 typewritten pages. It is not practicable, within the scope of this opinion, to give even the substance of the averments contained therein. An attempt to do so would be a waste of time on the part of the court, and the result would be of no value to any one. The pleading, if it may be properly so designated, is composed almost entirely of immaterial, redundant, and impertinent matter, much of which is scandalous, reflecting, as it does, upon the motives which influenced the action of the trial court, and also containing charges of crime and misconduct on the part of persons in no way connected with the case. If the improper matter were eliminated, the material facts might be concisely stated within the scope of two or three typewritten pages. The trial court could not permit these pleadings to stand in such a form, and, in order to purge the files, it was required either to strike it out as a whole or to separate the “two grains of wheat” from the “two bushels of chaff” and to eliminate the improper and objectionable matter. If the motion to strike had been directed to only such allegations as contain improper and objectionable matter, there could have been no doubt as to the propriety of sustaining it, but, by sustaining the motion to strike out the whole pleading, the proper and material allegations were carried out along with those that are improper and immaterial. Appellant asserts that it is error to strike out a pleading as a whole, where it contains proper and material allegations, even though it contains improper and scandalous matter.
It is the general rule that the motion to strike out, under such circumstances, should be directed only to the allegations which contain the improper matters, especially where the allegations can be eliminated, leaving such a connected statement of material facts as constitutes a sufficient pleading, or which is capable of being so amended as to make it sufficient.
A different rule prevails, however, with reference to pleadings in which the scandalous and impertinent matter predominates, as it does in the pleading under consideration, and where it is so mingled and blended with that which is pertinent and proper as to render the separation unpracticable or extremely difficult. In such a case the entire pleading may be struck from the files. Van Etten v. Butt, 32 Neb. 285, 49 N. W. 365;People v. Albany & C. Ry., 57 Barb. (N. Y.) 204; People v. Church, 2 Lans. (N. Y.) 459; Ringo v. New Farmers' Bank, 101 Ky. 91, 39 S. W. 701; Price v. Tyson, 3 Bland (Md.) 392-400, 22 Am. Dec. 279; A. General v. Parsell, 99 Mich. 381, 58 N. W. 335;Armstrong v. Phillips, 60 Hun, 243, 14 N. Y. Supp. 582;Mitchell v. Brown, 88 N. C. 156.
In the case of Ringo v. New Farmers' Bank, supra, the court struck out an answer as a whole because it contained scandalous matter, but granted defendant leave to file an answer eliminating the objectionable averments. If, after appellant's answer in abatement was struck out, he had offered to file a proper answer, the court, no doubt, would have given him leave to do so.
In the case of Mitchell v. Brown, supra, the court, in speaking of a replication containing improper language, said:
“The replication ought not to have been received with this offensive language, or, when discovered, should have been removed from the files until reformed and made consistent with the rules of pleading, as prescribed by the Code.”
Allegations which are pertinent cannot be scandalous, but if they are impertinent and reflect on character, or contain criminations, they are scandalous, whether true or false. If that which is stated is material to the issue, it may be false, but it cannot be scandalous. Ex parte Simpson, 15 Ves. Jr. 476. On the other hand, the fact that allegations of this character are true will not prevent them from being scandalous, if they are not material to the issue. Pearse v. Pearse, 29 L. T. N. S. 453.
A court is bound to purge its records of scandal; and, where a pleading or other paper filed in court is of such a character that the scandalous portion cannot be expunged without affecting the integrity and meaning of the remaining portion, it may be stricken out as a...
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