State v. Curran

• Decision Date: 26 April 1879
• Citation: 49 N.W. 1006,51 Iowa 112
• Parties: STATE v. CURRAN.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

51 Iowa 112

49 N.W. 1006

STATE

v.CURRAN.¹

Supreme Court of Iowa.

April 26, 1879.

Appeal from district court, Polk county.

Indictment of George Curran for seduction. There was judgment of conviction, and defendant appeals. Affirmed.Nourse & Kauffman and Bryan & Russell, for appellant.

J. F. McJunkin, Atty. Gen., for the State.

ADAMS, J.

1. The defendant demurred to the indictment on the ground that it “contained no charge of facts as to the means made use of to accomplish intercourse, which are essential to constitute the crime of seduction.” The charge is that the defendant “unlawfully and feloniously did seduce, carnally know, and debauch one Laura E. Herring.” The indictment, we think, is in the usual form, and sufficient. The offense is created by statute, and it is sufficient to charge in the words of the statute, unless the words used are such that they do not necessarily charge the offense. The words “seduce” and “debauch,” when used in connection, do, we think, necessarily charge the offense. It cannot be said that they need, when used in connection, to be helped out by a legal conclusion. In their common as well as legal acceptation they import the idea of illicit intercourse, accomplished by arts, promises, or deception, and have no other meaning.

2. The prosecuting witness testified that she commenced receiving the defendant's attentions about three years previous to the alleged seduction, and continued, with some interruptions, until she revealed to him the fact that she was pregnant, and asked him to marry her. Upon cross-examination she showed that during the time, or some part of it, she had an intimate acquaintance with several gentlemen, but she denied keeping company with any of them, and denied all improper intimacy. The defendant offered to introduce as a part of the cross-examination a letter admitted to be written by her to him. The court excluded it, and the defendant assigns the ruling as error. The letter contained the names of two of her male acquaintances. The object of introducing it evidently was to impeach either her fidelity to the defendant or her chastity. We will not set out the letter. It is sufficient to say that it could have the meaning claimed only by a strained construction. Besides, if the letter was material, it was more properly admissible as evidence in chief upon the part of the defendant than in cross-examination.

3. The prosecuting witness testified that there was a marriage engagement between her and the defendant, continuing through a considerable period of time. After the engagement was contracted, it appears that they quarreled and parted two or three times; but while the engagement was subsisting, with more or less harmony of feeling, she received a Christmas present and a birthday present from one of her male acquaintances by the name of Dickinson. Upon cross-examination she was asked a question in these words: “Did you, at the time that you were going with Dickinson, hear at any time that he said that you were engaged, and that the only thing lacking was the consent of your mother?” The state objected to the question, and the objection was sustained. The ruling is assigned as error. It is insisted in argument that, if the witness had heard that Dickinson claimed to be engaged to her, she had reason to suppose at least that he had matrimonial designs, and, if she received his attentions and presents with such supposition, her action was inconsistent with an engagement to the defendant, and the jury had a right to consider the fact in determining whether she was really engaged to defendant, as she claimed. But the question we think objectionable upon several grounds. It assumes that the witness was “going with Dickinson,” and we see no evidence to that effect. She received his presents, it is true, but she was not asked if she had heard of Dickinson's remark at that time. Besides, the remark attributed to him, if he made it, did not necessarily mean that he claimed that the witness was engaged to him.

4. The defendant assigns as error the refusal to allow a question put to the prosecutrix upon cross-examination, in these words: “Did you not, at the house of Mr. Haskill, in East Des Moines, in a conversation with Minerva Sims, put George's [the defendant's] picture along-side of Howard Peasley's, and say that you thought Howard's was the nicest?” It is claimed that the remark, if she made it, indicated a state of feeling upon her part inconsistent with the idea that she was engaged to the defendant, or could be seduced by him. Whether, if the prosecutrix was engaged to the defendant, and loved him as she claimed, it would have been impossible for her seriously to regard any other man as better looking, we express no opinion. We do not think the case is reversible upon this ground. Young ladies are not to be held to a very strict accountability when talking to their young lady friends about their lovers. Besides, it is proper to observe that the remark was not made about the young men themselves, but their pictures. The exclusion of the evidence was not error.

5. The father of the prosecuting witness was examined in behalf of the state. Having stated that he never had any conversation with the defendant about marrying his daughter, he was asked if he ever heard her talk about it in the family. The question was objected to by the defendant, and the objection was overruled. In overruling it the defendant claims that there was error. We think that the fact of the engagement could not be proven by what the prosecutrix said about it in the family. The objection, therefore, we think, might properly have been sustained. But if there was error, we think it was without prejudice. The witness was not asked and did not testify as to what the prosecutrix said about marrying the defendant. She might have talked of the possibility of marrying him, without claiming that there was an engagement.

6. One Mintie Curran was introduced as a witness in behalf of the defendant, and was asked a question in these words: “State whether or not, in the conversation you had with Laura some time in July, after the 22d, she referred to her cousins, the Winebrenners, and what a good time she had, and that her step-mother reproved her, and she said she delighted to do anything to spite her step-mother.” The state objected to this question, and the objection was sustained. The ruling is assigned as error. The fact that her step-mother reproved her would not show that her conduct was reprovable. At most it would only show that her step-mother was of that opinion. But the subject is not one for expert testimony, and, if it were, the expert should be introduced. Besides, a young lady might do many an act, while having a good time with her cousins, which a mother or step-mother might properly reprove, and yet which would involve nothing of unchastity.

7. The court refused to allow evidence of general good moral character on the part of defendant, but allowed evidence of his character for virtue. In this we think that there was no error. In 3 Greenleaf on Evidence, section 25, the author, speaking of evidence of moral character, says: “The evidence, when admissible, ought to be restricted to the trait of character which is in issue.” It is true that, where a person is charged with larceny, for instance, his general character for honesty may be regarded as involved, for the same trait of character that would lead a person to commit larceny would lead him to commit fraud and all other crimes by which one attempts wrongfully to obtain the property of another. But a character for chastity is different from that of honesty, and a character for peaceableness is different from either.

8. After the defendant had rested, the state called the father and mother of the prosecutrix, for the purpose of proving that the defendant was with the prosecutrix on the 17th of September, 1876,--being one of the times when the prosecutrix testified that the defendant had intercourse with her. The defendant objected, because such evidence would be evidence upon the original case, and not in rebuttal. The court overruled the objection, and admitted the evidence. The defendant assigns the ruling as error. The defendant had introduced in evidence a letter written him by the prosecutrix not long after the 17th of September, in which she invited him to come and see her, and giving as a reason that he had not been to see her for a long time. This letter, and the evidence in relation thereto, were introduced for the purpose of impeaching and destroying the testimony of the prosecutrix that the defendant had connection with her on the 17th day of September, which was not a long time, but a short time, before the writing of the letter. The testimony of the father and mother of the prosecutrix was introduced, as we infer, as rebutting this impeaching evidence. It could not, we think, have that effect. But it did have the effect to corroborate the prosecutrix. It was, therefore, evidence upon the original case. Section 4420 of the Code provides that, after both parties have rested, evidence upon the original case may be introduced for good reason, and in furtherance of justice. If the prosecutrix's letter and the evidence in relation thereto, introduced by the defendant, could be considered as having the effect of impeaching the testimony of the prosecutrix, as claimed by the defendant, it was in furtherance of justice, we think, to allow the state to corroborate her by showing that it was true that the defendant was with the prosecutrix on the 17th day of September, notwithstanding any statements in her letter inconsistent with her testimony. The fact that the testimony was offered in rebuttal would not prevent the court from admitting it, as upon the original case, if in furtherance of justice it should be so admitted; and the fact that it was not ostensibly so admitted would not justify a reversal, in the...