People v. Carrier
| Decision Date | 29 June 1881 |
| Citation | 9 N.W. 487,46 Mich. 442 |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
| Parties | PEOPLE v. CARRIER. |
The judge may, before a juror has been sworn in, excuse him upon any ground that to such judge seems sufficient. A juror was in the jury-box, both parties having expressed themselves as satisfied with him, but before the jury was sworn the prosecution challenged him peremptorily. Held, that the allowance of such challenge was not error. To make out the offence of enticing away a female under the age of 16 for the purpose of prostitution, concubinage, or marriage, it is sufficient if it is shown that she is enticed away from one into whose family she has with the consent of her parents been adopted or is living as an inmate, there is no legal guardianship. It is the actual state of things, and not the legal relation, that the statute contemplates. Any representation or suggestion to the female, made for the purpose of influencing her, although no means of direct solicitation be used, will, if it induces her to go away, be sufficient to make out a case of enticing; and in showing such enticement evidence of previous illicit relation between the two may be shown.
Exceptions from Calhoun.
Jacob Van Riper, for plaintiff.
W.K Gibson, W.H. Porter, and Atkinson & Atkinson, for defendant.
The charge on which the defendant has been convicted is of having, in the month of May, 1879, feloniously taken and enticed one Jennie L. Hendricks, a female under the age of 16 years, from and without the consent of James Barry, her guardian, who had the legal charge and custody of her person. In different counts of the information his intent is charged to have been for the purpose of prostitution, of concubinage and of marriage. The case comes up for review on exceptions before sentence.
1. The first exception is to the action of the court in excusing a juror. The record states that one John Blake, having the qualifications of a juror of said county, was summoned as a talesman, "to whom no challenge or objection was made by either party, whereupon said Blake stated he was in attendance at said court as a witness in a case yet to be tried at said term, and the next case on call," whereupon the judge excused him and the defendant excepted. The exception has no merit. Before a juror has been sworn in the case, the judge may excuse him for any reason personal to the juror which seems to the judge sufficient. This was recognized in Atlas Mining Co. v. Johnson, 23 Mich 36, but it needs no authority.
2. The prosecution was also permitted to challenge peremptorily a person who had once been placed in the jury-box, both parties saying they were satisfied with him. He had not been sworn and there is no doubt of the right to make the challenge. It was said on behalf of the defendant at the argument that the defendant had at the time exhausted his peremptory challenges. Whether that would make any difference we need not consider, as the record does not show the fact.
3. The principal exceptions relate to the right of Barry to be regarded as the legal guardian of the person of the girl for the purposes of the prosecution. The evidence tended to show that the father of the girl was dead or supposed to be dead that the mother was living with another man as his wife, but whether legally married to him did not appear; that the girl was living in Barry's family; and that on November 29, 1878, on the petition of the girl, who was then over 14 years of age, the judge of probate of Calhoun county appointed Barry to be her guardian. In the petition Jennie states that she is possessed of no estate, "but that it is necessary a guardian should be appointed for said minor for the purpose of taking care of the interest of said minor in her person." The order of appointment was the usual order which is made for the guardianship of property, and it is objected that it gave no legal control of the person. But the fact that Jennie lived in the family of Barry after the appointment with the consent or at least with the knowledge and without the objection of the mother was proved, and that she continued there until the time of the alleged offence. The necessaries of life were supplied to her in the mean time by Barry, as they were to other members of his family.
The circuit judge charged the jury that...
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