State v. Crawford

• Citation: 66 Iowa 318,23 N.W. 684
• Parties: STATE v. CRAWFORD.
• Decision Date: 05 June 1885
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Iowa

66 Iowa 318

23 N.W. 684

STATE

v.CRAWFORD.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Filed June 5, 1885.

Appeal from Cass district court.

The defendant was indicted for the crime of an assault with intent to commit murder. He was tried and convicted of an assault with intent to commit manslaughter, and he appeals.A. S. Churchill, for appellant.

A. J. Baker, Atty. Gen., for the State.

ROTHROCK, J.

1. The charging part of the indictment is as follows: “The said William Crawford, on the twenty-seventh day of November, 1881, in the county aforesaid, did then and there, with a deadly weapon, to-wit, a revolver, then and there loaded and charged with powder and ball, and then and there held in the hands of the said defendant, willfully, unlawfully, feloniously, with malice aforethought, and with specific intent to kill and murder one Jesse Cameron, then and there being, in and upon the said Jesse Cameron, make a felonious assault by then and there attempting to shoot and kill the said defendant, with the said revolver, and did then and there shoot off and discharge the contents of said revolver at, towards, and against the said Jesse Cameron with unlawful and felonious intent then and there to kill and murder the said Jesse Cameron.” The evidence showed that the name of the party upon whom the assault was made, was Jesse Cannon, and that his full name was Jesse Walker Cannon. The defendant moved in arrest of judgment upon the ground of the misnomer in the indictment.

It is provided in section 4302 of the Code that “when an offense involves the commission of or an attempt to commit an injury to the person or property, and is described in other respects with sufficient certainty to identify the act, an erroneous allegation as to the name of the person injured, or attempted to be injured, is not material.” This provision of the statute would of itself seem to be sufficient to authorize the overruling of the motion in arrest of judgment upon this ground. There is no showing that the defendant was in any way misled by the misnomer. On the contrary, the record shows quite conclusively that the defendant was not in any way prejudiced by this mistake in the indictment. The facts are that he shot at Jesse Cannon with a revolver, and wounded him in the arm and back, was arrested, confined in jail, and had a preliminary examination; and it does not appear that he shot any other person at or about the time charged in the indictment. That such a variance is immaterial under our statute, see State v. Emeigh, 18 Iowa, 122;State v. Flynn, 42 Iowa, 164;State v. Carr, 43 Iowa, 418.

2. Another ground of the motion in arrest was that the indictment charged the defendant with making an assault and attempting to shoot and kill “ the said defendant.” Perhaps, under the strictures of the common law, this objection might be held to be fatal to the indictment, but under our Code of Criminal Procedure courts are not required to determine the rights of parties, charged upon mere technicalities. We are required to ignore any defect or imperfection in an indictment “which does not tend to the prejudice of the substantial rights of the defendant upon the merits.” Code, § 4306. A mere casual reading of...