State v. Eva Shadroui
| Decision Date | 15 November 1915 |
| Parties | STATE v. EVA SHADROUI |
| Court | Vermont Supreme Court |
October Term, 1915.
COMPLAINT, filed in the city court of the city of Barre by a grand juror under P. S. 5204, charging that the respondent did at divers times sell or furnish intoxicating liquor without authority. Trial by jury, Scott, Judge. Verdict guilty; and judgment and sentence thereon. The respondent excepted. The opinion states the case.
The judgment overruling the motion is reversed, the motion is sustained, judgment is arrested, and the respondent is discharged.
Richard A. Hoar for the respondent.
Fred E. Gleason, State's Attorney for the State.
Present MUNSON, C. J., WATSON, HASELTON, POWERS, AND TAYLOR, JJ.
Under the provisions of P. S. 5204, it is a criminal offence for a person without a license to furnish or sell intoxicating liquor; and it is also an offence for such a person to expose or keep intoxicating liquor with intent to furnish or sell the same. Each of these offences is separate and distinct from the other, requiring different evidence in its prosecution as well as in defence. The complaint filed against the respondent charges her disjunctively, in one count, with both of these offences. The court instructed the jury to return a verdict only on the issue as to the latter, and thereon a verdict of guilty was rendered. After verdict and before judgment, the respondent moved in arrest of judgment, one of the grounds assigned being that the two offences are charged disjunctively in one count. The motion was overruled, and an exception saved.
By section 5236 of the statutes, a form of complaint is prescribed to be substantially followed in prosecutions for selling or furnishing intoxicating liquor without authority. This form does not include the offence of unlawfully exposing or keeping such liquor with intent to furnish or sell the same. But section 5237 provides that in informations and indictments for offences under that chapter (219) of the statutes, the description of the offence may be substantially in the same form so far as the case will admit. This does not, however, authorize the joining of the two offences named above, alternatively, in the same count of the complaint.
Serjeant Hawkins lays it down in his pleas of the Crown, (Vol. II. Ch 25, Sec. 58,) that an indictment charging a man disjunctively with two distinct offences, is void; for it appears not of which of them the indictors have...
To continue reading
Request your trial