South v. State

• Decision Date: 26 October 1896
• Citation: 37 S.W. 210,97 Tenn. 496
• Parties: SOUTH v. STATE.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

37 S.W. 210

97 Tenn. 496

SOUTH v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

October 26, 1896

Appeal from circuit court, Sullivan county; H. T. Campbell, Judge.

Samuel South was convicted of abduction, and appeals. Affirmed.

Thos Curtin, Hal H. Haynes, and D. F. Bailey, for appellant.

Dana Harmon, Dist. Atty. Gen., Joseph Burrow, A. H. Blanchard, and G. W. Pickle, for the State.

WILKES J.

Defendant is convicted of abduction, and sentenced to 12 years in the state penitentiary, and has appealed. It appears that he is a man of extensive influence and high standing in his community. He is a farmer, merchant, justice of the peace deputy marshal, formerly tax collector, and constable. He is about 44 years of age, and has a family, a wife and eight children, some of them grown daughters. The female said to have been abducted is the daughter of a near neighbor, about 17 years of age, whom the defendant had known from her childhood,-the associate and companion of his own daughters. The defense is put broadly upon the ground that defendant is guilty of seduction of the girl, for which he might be made to respond in a civil action for damages, but that he is not guilty of the legal offense of abduction, for which he can be punished criminally.

Certain letters written to him by the girl were given in evidence over the defendant's objection, and it is claimed this is error. It appears that these letters were introduced on the committing trial before the justice of the peace by the defendant himself, but, when offered by the state in the circuit court, were objected to by him, and read over his objection. It appears that he also wrote letters to the girl but she states that at his request she burned them, while he kept hers, thinking, as he states, that he might at some time need them. While we do not consider these letters as very important, in view of the other testimony in the case, still it was not error to allow them to be read, as explaining the relations of the parties, and their feelings and conduct toward each other. They could not have been manufactured for the purposes of the trial, and as an afterthought by the girl, because they were produced by the defendant himself on the committing trial. The letters thoroughly accord with the testimony of the girl in the case.

The Code (Mill. & V. § 5370) provides that any person who takes any female from her father, mother, guardian, or other person having the legal charge of her, without his or her consent for the purpose of prostitution or concubinage, shall upon conviction be imprisoned in the penitentiary not less than 10 nor more than 21 years. Without going into details, it is sufficient to say that, while there is some contradiction between his statement and hers, and some slight variance between the testimony of other witnesses on minor points, it satisfactorily appears that, early in 1895, the defendant began a systematic effort to overthrow the chastity and virtue of the girl. It also appears, as to him, she was indiscreet and forward. By kind treatment, little acts of favoritism, and gradual approaches, he ingratiated himself into her good opinion, and she was much about him at his store and at his home and elsewhere, until their intimacy became a matter of general comment and notice in the community, and her indiscretions attracted the attention of her father. It is, we think, clearly proven that he attempted to use drugs and whisky to accomplish his purpose, and did use them to some extent. The girl's version is that he took advantage of her, when under their influence, to accomplish his purpose in his own house, and that afterwards she submitted on several occasions to him at other places. It clearly appears that, in consequence of their relations, she became anxious to leave home, and he encouraged her to do so, and promised to arrange for her to go, and did make some preparations to that end. About this time she went to his storehouse, and spent two nights in it with him. Whether she went of her own accord, or was signaled and induced to go, is a matter...