La Rosae v. State

• Decision Date: 16 September 1892
• Docket Number: 16,643
• Citation: La Rosae v. State, 132 Ind. 219, 31 N. E. 798 (Ind. 1892)
• Parties: La Rosae v. The State
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

31 N.E. 798

132 Ind. 219

La Rosae v. The State

No. 16,643

Supreme Court of Indiana

September 16, 1892

From the Noble Circuit Court.

The judgment is reversed with instructions to grant the defendant a new trial, and for further proceedings in accordance with this opinion.

L. H Wrigley, for appellant.

L.D.Fleming Prosecuting Attorney, and H. C. Peterson, for the State.

OPINION

Miller, J.

The appellant was prosecuted and convicted for the seduction of a female of good repute for chastity and under the age of twenty-one years.

The sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the verdict of the jury is the only question presented by the record.

The point made by counsel for appellant is that the evidence of the prosecutrix is not corroborated in accordance with the provision of section 1807, R. S. 1881, which is as follows:

"In prosecutions for seduction, and for enticing and taking away a female for the purposes of prostitution, the evidence of the female must be corroborated to the extent required as to the principal witness in cases of perjury."

Several witnesses were placed upon the stand to show the good repute of the prosecuting witness for chastity, but the only evidence introduced to corroborate the testimony of the prosecutrix, is contained in the evidence given by Charles Simon, of a conversation with the appellant on the street, about the 20th of December, 1891, in which appellant said "that Ella was a good girl and he expected to make her Mrs. La Rosae."

Assuming that this evidence tends to corroborate the testimony of the prosecutrix, that her seduction was accomplished under promise of marriage, the question arises whether a corroboration of her testimony as to one of the material elements necessary to make up the crime, is a sufficient compliance with the requirements of the statute above cited.

So far as we have been able to discover, this statute has never been judicially construed by the courts of this State, but provisions bearing more or less similarity have been, not infrequently, before the courts in other jurisdictions, and we are therefore not without the assistance afforded by adjudged cases.

The statute of Minnesota provides that "No conviction shall be had under the provisions of this section on the testimony of the female seduced, unsupported by other evidence."

In construing this statute in State v. Timmens, 4 Minn. 325 (332), the court said:

"A conviction can not be had under this statute upon the testimony of the woman seduced unless she is corroborated upon every material point necessary to the perfection of the offence, to wit: the promise to marry, the seduction under such promise, and the previous chaste character of the party seduced."

This case was cited with approval in State v. Brinkhaus, 34 Minn. 285, 25 N.W. 642.

In New York the statute declared that "No conviction shall be had on the testimony of the female seduced, unsupported by other evidence."

In Kenyon v. People, 26 N.Y. 203, the court held that no corroboration was necessary upon the points that she was an unmarried female of previous chaste character, saying, "It was only necessary that she should be supported by direct evidence or proof of circumstances, as to the facts constituting the crime. These were the promise and the intercourse."

This construction was adhered to in the subsequent cases of Armstrong v. People, 70 N.Y. 38; and People v. Plath, 100 N.Y. 590, 3 N.E. 790.

In North Carolina the statute provides that "The unsupported testimony of the woman shall not be sufficient to convict."

In State v. Ferguson, 107 N.C. 841, 12 S.E. 574, the trial court instructed the jury that criminal seduction was made up of three ingredients: (1) There must be the act of sexual intercourse. (2) The act must be committed under promise of marriage. (3) The woman must be in the character of an innocent woman; and that if the prosecutrix was supported as to the truth of the existence of any one of these ingredients the case was brought within the provisions of the act.

This instruction was held to be erroneous, the court saying, in substance, that supporting proof of some of the ingredients was not sufficient to sustain prosecution. The defendant admitted the act of sexual intercourse, but this was decided not to be a sufficient corroboration.

The statute of New Jersey provides that in such cases, "the evidence of the female must be corroborated to the extent required in case of indictment for perjury."

In Zabriskie v. State, 43 N.J.L. 640, the court held that in order to warrant a conviction under this...