State v. Gill
Decision Date | 10 February 1911 |
Citation | 150 Iowa 210,129 N.W. 821 |
Parties | STATE v. GILL ET AL. |
Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from District Court, Mahaska County; W. C. Clements, Judge.
The defendants were convicted of keeping a house of ill fame, and they appeal. Affirmed.C. Ver Ploeg, for appellants.
H. W. Byers, Atty. Gen., and C. W. Lyon, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
The defendants were jointly indicted, and, as they are husband and wife, counsel argue that the presumption that what the latter did was by coercion of the husband and for this reason she should have been acquitted. As to many offenses committed in the husband's presence, such is the rule. State v. Harvey, 130 Iowa, 394, 106 N. W. 938;State v. Kelly, 74 Iowa, 589, 38 N. W. 503; State v. Fitsgerald, 49 Iowa, 260, 31 Am. Rep. 148. But this rule has no application to the crime of keeping a bawdyhouse or house of ill fame, “for this is an offense as to the government of the house in which the wife has the principal share, and also such an offense as may generally be presumed to be managed by the intrigue of her sex.” 1 Hawk. P. C. C. § 12; State v. Jones, 53 W. Va. 613, 45 S. E. 916;Com. v. Cheney, 114 Mass. 281;State v. Bentz, 11 Mo. 27. See Rex v. Dixon, 10 Mod. 335.
2. Complaint is made of the refusal by the court to instruct the jury that “in order to find the defendants guilty * * * you must find from the evidence that the men or persons frequenting said defendant's house were of ill repute, and were of licentious inclinations.” Such a finding was not essential. If persons frequented such places for the purpose of indulging their sexual passions or some other lewd purpose, as the jury were told was necessary in order to convict, they must have had the “inclination” mentioned, and it was immaterial of what repute they were. Regrettable though it be, persons of good repute are sometimes found at such places, but this extenuates in no manner the crime of their maintenance. The instruction was rightly refused.
3. Another instruction was requested and refused. This directed an acquittal unless Of course, a single act of illicit intercourse in a place will not alone constitute it a house of ill fame, nor at the common law did any number of incontinent acts by the proprietor with one or many persons. A bawdyhouse was defined as “a house of ill fame, kept for the resort and convenience of lewd people of both sexes,” and it was said in State v. Evans, 27 N. C. 603, that . And such is the view of the law entertained in other decisions. People v. Buchanan, 1 Idaho, 681;Moore v. State, 4 Tex. App. 127;State v. Calley, 104 N. C. 858, 10 S. E. 455, 17 Am. St. Rep. 704; Bishop's New Criminal Law, § 1085. And an instruction so stating seems to have been approved in State v. Lee, 80 Iowa, 75, 45 N. W. 545, 20 Am. St. Rep. 401. In People v. Mallette, 79 Mich. 600, 44 N. W. 962, a different opinion was expressed though without discussion or citation. Whether such is the law in view of language of the statute and the more recent decision need not now be determined, for the facts of this case do not bring it within the rule as contended for here--the defendants lived together, and the husband in permitting his wife to turn the house into a place of prostitution became equally guilty with her. As he was proprietor of the place, even though his wife may have participated in its government, any acts of incontinence with her were not with the proprietor, and therefore might constitute the place a bawdyhouse, even though never...
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State Of West Va. v. Crummitt
...17 Ala. App. 307, 84 So. 783. One instance of resort to a house for the purpose of prostitution likewise is insufficient. State v. Gill, 150 Iowa 210, 129 N. W. 821; Herzinger v. State, 70 Md. 278, 17 A. 81. One meeting of lewd women and men at a house for the purpose of prostitution does n......
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Dawson v. United States
...45 S. E. 916, 917; People v. Wheeler, 142 Mich. 212, 105 N. W. 607; Haffner v. State, 176 Wis. 471, 187 N. W. 173, 175; State v. Gill, 150 Iowa, 210, 129 N. W. 821. In State v. Nowell, 156 N. C. 648, 72 S. E. 590, 591, a married woman was charged with the abduction of a 14 year old girl. Th......