Lockhart v. State
| Decision Date | 01 January 1853 |
| Citation | 10 Tex. 275 |
| Parties | LOCKHART v. THE STATE. |
| Court | Texas Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
A room kept as a common resort for persons desiring to play cards for money, although every person that desires may not be permitted to have access to it, is a public house within the meaning of the statute. (Hart. Dig., art. 568.) (Note 50.)
Appeal from San Augustine. The appellant was indicted under the 72d section of the act “concerning crimes and misdemeanors.” (Hart. Dig., art. 568.) The indictment charging that the defendant “did permit a game with cards, upon which money was then and there bet, to be played in his house, which said house was then and there a public house, and was then and there a room occupied by said Wm. Lockhart, and was then and there a common gaming room, adjoining and connected with a room used in the town of San Augustine, by one Samuel Jordan and one William T. White, as a house for retailing spirituous liquors; and that said Wm. Lockhart well knew that divers persons then and there assembled in the said room of him, the said Wm. Lockhart, were playing in the said common gaming room a game with cards, upon which money was then and there bet, yet he, the said Wm. Lockhart, did unlawfully and wilfully permit the said game then and there to be played,” &c.
The averments in the indictment were fully sustained by the proof. The room was under the control of the defendant; he used it as a bedroom, and permitted it to be habitually resorted to and used for gaming by persons who played cards for money. He was the bar-keeper of Jordan & White, who retailed spirituous liquors in an adjoining room. The room was a shed room, and was under the same roof with a billiard room and the room in which the liquors were vended. It was a place of common resort for those who played cards for money.
The court charged the jury in substance that to authorize a verdict of guilty, they must be satisfied that the defendant kept a common gambling house or room, where he permitted persons generally to play games at cards for money; but to sustain the charge in the indictment it was not necessary to prove on the part of the State that every person who desired had access to the room; proof that any given number of persons were permitted habitually to play there would be sufficient.
The defendant was found guilty, and moved for a new trial and in arrest of judgment; which motions the court overruled, and the defendant appealed.
Attorney General, for appellee.
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