State v. Clerkin
| Decision Date | 30 October 1889 |
| Citation | 19 A. 517,58 Conn. 98 |
| Court | Connecticut Supreme Court |
| Parties | STATE v. CLERKIN. |
Appeal from superior court, New Haven county; TORRANCE, Judge.
Gen. St. Conn. § 1583, provides that any agent of a public community who shall, with intent to prejudice it, appropriate its property, or make upon its books any false entry, or aid in procuring to be allowed any fraudulent claim, shall be fined, etc.
J. W. Ailing, for the State. W. B. Stoddard and J. P. Pigott, for respondent.
The defendant was arraigned upon a complaint which alleged that he was "an agent of the town of New Haven, employed by the selectmen of said town at its cost and charges, under special authority of said town conferred by certain votes of annual town-meetings of said town duly warned and held for that purpose, * * * which votes were alike in form, and a copy thereof is as follows: 'Voted, that the selectmen be and are hereby authorized to employ such assistance for the office of the town agent as in their judgment may be necessary, and to fix the amount of compensation for the same;' that the said Clerkin was so employed to assist said selectmen in the care of the paupers of said town, and more especially to aid said selectmen in making disbursements of money for the relief of the paupers of said town, and to make on the books and accounts and papers of said town the proper entries concerning the paupers of said town, and prepare the necessary orders on the treasurer of said town for the money so to be disbursed for the relief of said paupers." The complaint then charged that while he was so acting, and in the performance of his duties in said capacity, he misappropriated sundry sums of money belonging to the town, made false entries upon its books, drew certain orders upon its treasury with intent to$$$
prejudice it, and aided to be allowed fraudulent claims against it, in the manner specifically set out in the 12 counts of the complaint. To this complaint the defendant demurred, and for his substantial ground of demurrer assigned the following: "Because it appears that every overt act alleged to have been done by the defendant was done in his capacity as clerk and employe of the board of selectmen of said New Haven, and not as agent or officer of said town." The court below sustained the demurrer, and ordered the prisoner discharged. The state appealed.
The defendant moves to erase the case from the docket of this court, claiming that the statute authorizing appeals by the state in criminal cases does not extend the right of such appeal to errors in proceedings upon demurrer, but is limited to errors committed by the court after the jury has been impaneled, or at least after the prisoner has been put to plea. The statute in question (Gen. St.§ 1637) reads as follows: "Appeals from the rulings and decisions of the superior court * * * upon all questions of law arising oh the trial of criminal cases may be taken by the state * * * in the same manner and to the same effect as if made by the accused." The words "arising on the trial" are relied upon by the defense as limiting the right of appeal as stated. An examination of the history and judicial construction of our statutes substituting appeals for former modes of relief shows the fallacy of this claim. The original act (Sess. Laws 1882, p. 144) reads as follows: "All questions of law arising on the trial of any cause or action, civil or criminal, * * * which may now be carried to the superior court or the supreme court of errors for revision by motion for a new trial, either for errors of a judge or verdict against evidence, or for any other cause whatever, or by motion in error, shall hereafter be removed to such higher court by an appeal from the judgment of the court where such cause or action was tried, and no motions for new trials or motions in error shall hereafter be allowed, but this act shall not affect writs of error or petitions for new trials." Here the intention is unmistakable that by "questions of law arising on the trial" is meant all questions which could theretofore have been reviewed, either upon motions in error or motions for a new trial, and such has been the interpretation of the act by this court. Schlesinger v. Chapman, 52 Conn. 272; Brewster v. Cowen, 55 Conn. 152, 10 Atl. Rep. 509. It will be noticed, in a study of this act, that the words and phrases which so plainly indicate the intent are not so used as to enlarge or amplify the words descriptive of the appealable questions. Whatever questions are made subjects of appeal are so because they come within the meaning of the descriptive words "questions of law arising on the trial."
We might well here rest upon judicial construction, but it is interesting to follow further the history of these statutes,...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Breen v. Phelps
...§ 52-263. The words "arising in the trial" have been read broadly to include motions made in the trial court. State v. Clerkin, 58 Conn. 98, 100-101, 19 A. 517 (1889).7 Although the judgment file in this case purports to dispose of only the second count of the complaint, because the first c......
-
State v. Moreno
...therefore, that the defendant's employment was within the natural and ordinary meaning of the letter of the statute.' State v. Clerkin, 58 Conn. 98, 104, 19 A. 517, 519; see Kops v. State, 220 Ind. 373, 381, 42 N.E.2d 'The term 'agent' as used in embezzlement statutes is construed in its po......
-
State v. Audet
...under § 54-96 include any proceeding from which either a criminal defendant or a party to a civil trial could appeal. State v. Clerkin, 58 Conn. 98, 101-102, 19 A. 517. In State v. Villafane, 164 Conn. 637, 325 A.2d 251, the state appealed, with permission, from the court's actions on a ple......
-
State v. Little
... ... 847 (64 S.E. 431); ... State v. Murrey, 30 Wash. 383 (70 P. 971); State ... v. Kemp, 5 Wash. 212 (31 P. 711); State v ... Hart, 88 N.J.L. 48 (95 A. 756); State v. Morris ... (Ala.), [210 Iowa 374] 39 So. 589; Territory v ... Norris, 12 Ariz. 176 (100 P. 459); State v ... Clerkin, 58 Conn. 98 (19 A. 517); State v ... Frisbee, 8 Okla.Crim. 406 (127 P. 1091); People v ... Damron, 212 N.Y. 256 (106 N.E. 67) ... In ... State v. Miller, 81 Iowa 72, 46 N.W. 751, in which ... the State was the appellant, one of the rulings of the trial ... court ... ...