State v. Bunker

• Decision Date: 26 December 1903
• Citation: 98 Me. 387,57 A. 95
• Parties: STATE v. BUNKER.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

57 A. 95

98 Me. 387

STATE

v. BUNKER.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Dec. 26, 1903.

(Official.)

Agreed Case from Supreme Judicial Court, Hancock County.

Hazen Bunker was indicted for taking clams. Case submitted on agreed statement Judgment for defendant.

Indictment for taking clams by the defendant, a nonresident, within the limits of the town of Lamoine, Hancock county, March 18, 1903.

The case was reported upon an agreed statement of facts and portions of the records of the town of Lamoine showing such municipal regulations as the town had made concerning the taking of clams within its limits.

The statutory provisions applicable to the case are found in chapter 284, p. 310, § 37, of the statute of 1901, and are as follows:

"Any town may at its annual meeting fix the times in which clams may be taken within its limits, and the prices for which its municipal officers shall grant permits therefor; and unless so regulated by vote', residents of the town may take clams without written permit. But without permit any inhabitant within his own town, or transient person therein, may take clams for the consumption of himself and family. This section does not apply to hotel keepers taking clams for the use of their hotels, nor does it interfere with any law relating to the taking of shell fish for bait by fishermen. Whoever takes clams contrary to municipal regulations authorized by this section, shall, for each offense, be fined not more than ten dollars, or imprisoned not more than thirty days or both."

The parties further agreed that the defendant at the time alleged in the indictment, to wit, March 18, 1903, upon a shore within the town of Lamoine, did take clams. The defendant did not take such clams for bait as a fisherman, nor as a hotel keeper for the use of his hotel. The defendant was then and there a resident in the town of Trenton, and not of Lamoine, and was not a transient person therein taking clams for the consumption of himself and family, and the said clams were taken by the defendant for factory and canning purposes.

Said clams so taken were at the time in a natural state, not artificially propagated nor inclosed.

Argued before WISWELL, C. J., and EMERY, STROUT, SAVAGE, PEABODY, and SPEAR, JJ.

Bedford E. Tracy, Co. Atty., for the State.

L. B. Deasy, for defendant.

WISWELL, C. J. After chapter 284, p. 300, Pub. Laws 1901, approved March 22, 1901, took effect, the only statute in this state which in any way regulated or...