State v. Caine

• Citation: 105 N.W. 1018
• Parties: STATE v. CAINE.
• Decision Date: 06 February 1906
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Iowa

105 N.W. 1018

STATE

v.CAINE.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Feb. 6, 1906.

Appeal from District Court, Woodbury County; G. W. Wakefield, Judge.

The defendant, with one Charles McGuire, was indicted for the crime of conspiracy. He was granted a separate trial, found guilty, and, judgment having been entered on the verdict, he appeals. Reversed.C. A. Irwin and Wilbur Owen, for appellant.

Chas. W. Mullan, Atty. Gen., and Lawrence De Graff, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

BISHOP, J.

The indictment is in two counts. In the first it is charged that the defendants, Caine and McGuire, and divers other unknown persons, at a time and place named, did unlawfully and feloniously conspire, agree, and confederate together, with the malicious intent and purpose, wrongfully and feloniously, to injure the person of H. H. Howman and of other persons named, and of other persons to the grand jury unknown, by assaulting, beating, and wounding such persons. In the second count it is charged, in substance, that said defendants, and others unknown, on the date and at the place named in the first count, did conspire, etc., to do an act injurious to the public police, and to injure the business, property, and rights of property of the Cudahy Packing Company, and alleges as the particular means agreed upon to carry out said conspiracy by the said defendants, and other unknown persons, being to unlawfully beat, wound, strike, assault. inflict bodily injury and harm upon, and threaten with bodily harm and injury, and to use profane, vulgar, and indecent language toward, all persons in the employ of the Cudahy Packing Company, or who might seek employment of said company, or who might have business engagements with said company, at their place of business in Sioux City, Iowa, or who might have business engagements in or around the buildings or property of said company at Sioux City, and especially to use and employ the particular means above set forth toward C. W. Jackson, sheriff, and H. H. Hawman and S. A. Huntley, deputy sheriffs, of Woodbury county, Iowa, all of said means being used by the defendants, and other unknown persons, for the purpose of wrongfully harassing and annoying said company and to frighten its employés and prospective employés, and deter them from entering or remaining in the employ of said company, thereby preventing said company from carrying on its business. Following a plea of not guilty a jury was impaneled, whereupon the defendant moved the court that the state be required to elect upon which count of the indictment it would proceed. As grounds therefor, the defendant urged upon the court that “the acts charged in the separate counts constituting an alleged conspiracy are different and separate acts, and therefore under the statute two separate and distinct crimes. And for the further reason, if it was possible or conceivable, under any condition of affairs or state of facts, that the acts charged in the two separate counts could constitute one and the same offense, no facts, as distinguished from legal conclusions, are stated in the indictment showing that the acts charged in the first count, and the acts charged in the second count are parts and parcel of one and the same offense or of one and the same transaction.” The motion was overruled. At the close of the evidence for the state the defendant again moved the court to require the state to elect, and upon substantially the same grounds as...