Mills v. State
| Decision Date | 10 January 1910 |
| Parties | MILLS v. STATE. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
In Banc. Error to Circuit Court, Madison County; B. H. Palmer Judge.
Bill Mills was convicted of crime, and brings error. Affirmed.
Syllabus by the Court
An indictment charging the crime substantially in the language of the statute will be adjudged good, unless it becomes necessary to state the circumstances which constitute the definition of the offense charged in order to advise the prisoner of the nature of the charge against him.
An indictment will not be quashed or judgment arrested on account of any defect in the form of the indictment, unless the court is of the opinion that the indictment is so vague indistinct, and indefinite as to mislead the accused and embarrass him in the preparation of his defense, or expose him after conviction or acquittal to substantial danger of a new prosecution for the same offense.
The requisite degree of certainty in an indictment must have reference to the matter to be charged and the manner or form of charging it.
If the indictment be defective in the statment of matter to be charged, if it entirely omits averment of an element of the offense, or fails to state the circumstances which constitute the definition of the offense charged when necessary to advise the prisoner of the nature of the charge against him such defect or omission will be fatal to the indictment upon a motion in arrest of judgment.
Where the indictment is not so vague, indefinite, or indistinct as to mislead the accused and embarrass him in the preparation of his defense, objections founded upon defects going rather to the form than to the substance of the indictment must be made by motion to quash, or the defendant should demand before trial a bill of particulars of these matters omitted.
In a prosecution for violation of section 3356 of the General Statutes, where the indictment charges that the defendant sold or disposed of the described property to him belonging and in his possession, that the property was subject to a statutory lien at the time of its sale by the defendant, and alleging sufficient to advise the defendant of the nature of the lien and how it arose, and that the property was sold without the written consent of the holder of the lien, a motion to arrest the judgment will not be sustained, although there may be defects or uncertainties in the form of these allegations that might be fatal on a motion to quash.
In a prosecution for violation of section 3356 of the General Statutes by selling personal property subject to a statutory lien, the failure of the indictment to allege the name of the person to whom the property was sold, and the manner of the disposition of the property and other details of the transaction, will not expose the defendant to a substantial danger of a new prosecution for the same offense, for in a subsequent prosecution upon an indictment making these allegations the defendant would have the right to establish the identity of the transactions by proof, and he would not lose the benefit of a plea of former conviction.
Objections to the sufficiency of the indictment cannot be made by objecting to the evidence in support of it.
A motion in arrest of judgment will not lie for the improper admission of exclusion of evidence.
To constitute the offense of selling property subject to a statutory lien, the sale of the property must have been made by the debtor during the existence of the lien.
If the sale of property subject to a statutory lien was criminal as a misdemeanor when made, it could not be purged of its criminality by any subsequent payment.
While all common-law crimes consist of two elements--the criminal act or omission, and the mental element, commonly called criminal intent--it is within the power of the Legislature to dispense with the necessity for a criminal intent, and to punish particular acts without regard to the mental attitude of the doer.
The language of the statute (section 3356 of the General Statutes) does not require proof of the specific intent to defeat the lien created thereby, and it is evident the Legislature did not intend that it should do so.
COUNSEL Hardee & Rowe, for plaintiff in error.
Park Trammell, Atty. Gen., for the State.
The plaintiff seeks relief here by writ of error from a conviction under an indictment, of which, omitting the formal parts, the following is a copy:
'The grand jurors of the state of Florida, duly chosen, impaneled, and sworn diligently to inquire and true presentment make in and for the body of the county of Madison, upon their oath present that Bill Mills, on the first day of December, A. D. 1908, in the county and state aforesaid, with force and arms, did then and there sell and dispose of one thousand pounds of cotton and one hundred bushels of corn to him belonging and in his possession, which said one thousand pounds of cotton and one hundred bushels of corn was subject to a statutory lien, to wit, a lien for land rent in favor of one S. B. Mays, said cotton and corn having been grown upon lands of said S. B. Mays, and said Bill Mills did not have the written consent of said S. B. Mays to dispose of or sell said property.'
The first error assigned is the denial of a motion in arrest of judgment. The defendant moved to arrest the judgment because the indictment does not charge an offense, and is so vague and uncertain as not to put defendant on notice as to the charge he is to answer, and as not to protect him against further prosecutions for the same offense, and because the indictment does not allege the year during which the lien existed, nor the year during which the cotton and corn were grown, nor to whom the cotton and corn were sold, nor the manner in which the cotton and corn were disposed of, nor that the defendant was indebted to S. B. Mays for rent.
The offense sought to be charged is purely statutory; section 3356 of the General Statutes of 1906 providing that whoever shall pledge, mortgage, or sell or otherwise dispose of any personal property to him belonging, or which shall be in his possession, which shall be subject to any statutory lien, whether written or not, without the written consent of the person holding such lien, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding $500 or imprisonment not exceeding one year.
Section 3961 of the General Statutes of 1906 provides: 'Every indictment shall be deemed and adjudged good which charges the crime substantially in the language of the statute prohibiting the crime or prescribing the punishment if any such there be.' This is a copy of the enactment in England by 6 St. Geo. IV, § 21, and judgment cannot be arrested there for the want of additional averments, however necessary, owing to the imperfect manner in which offenses are sometimes described in statutes, but the prisoner must take advantage of the defect by demurrer. State v. Lockbaum, 38 Conn. 400. In construing our statute, we have said that an indictment charging the crime substantially in the language of the statute will be adjudged good, unless it becomes necessary to state the circumstances which constitute the definition of the offense charged in order to advise the prisoner of the nature of the charge against him, as would be the case where the indictment for publishing an obscene figure or picture failed to give any description of the same sufficient to advise the defendant of the nature of the charge against him, a defect that may be taken advantage of by motion in arrest of judgment. Reyes v. State, 34 Fla. 181, 15 So. 875; Hamilton v. State, 30 Fla. 229, 11 So. 523; Stevens v. State, 18 Fla. 903.
At common law, where an indictment was defective on demurrer, advantage might also have been taken of the defect on motion in arrest of judgment. Murray v. State, 9 Fla. 246. Now, by the enactment of section 1, c. 1107, Acts 1861, known as section 3962 Gen. St. 1906, an indictment will not be quashed or judgment will not be arrested on account of any defect in the form of the indictment, unless the court is of the opinion that the indictment is so vague, indistinct, and indefinite as to mislead the accused and embarrass him in the preparation of his defense, or expose him after conviction or acquittal to substantial dangel of a new prosecution for the same offense. Strobhar v. State, 55 Fla. 167, 47 So. 4.
The requisite degree of certainty in an indictment must have reference to the matter to be charged and the manner or form of charging it. If the indictment be defective in the statement of matter to be charged, if it entirely omits an averment which is an element of the offense, or fails to state the circumstances which constitute the definition of the offense charged when necessary to advise the prisoner of the nature of the charge against him, such defect or omission will be fatal to the indictment upon a motion in arrest of judgment. Stevens v. State, 18 Fla. 903; Grant v. State, 35 Fla. 581, 17 So. 225, 48 Am. St. Rep. 263. A failure to allege jurisdictional facts in the indictment is not cured by verdict. Reyes v. State, supra.
In Thomas alias Henry v. State (lately decided) 50 So. 954 where the statute made it an offense to shoot into a railroad car used or occupied by a person or persons, we adjudged the indictment fatally defective on a motion in arrest of judgment for a failure to allege the necessary averment of the use or occupation of the car. And so in the instant case would we adjudge the indictment bad upon motion in arrest did it fail to allege either (1) that the defendant sold or disposed of the described property to him belonging or in his possession; or (2) that the property was subject to a statutory lien at the time of...
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