State v. Porter

• Decision Date: 05 June 1906
• Citation: 107 N.W. 923,130 Iowa 690
• Parties: STATE v. PORTER.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

130 Iowa 690

107 N.W. 923

STATE

v.PORTER.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

June 5, 1906.

Appeal from District Court, Madison County; Jas. D. Gamble, Judge.

Defendant was convicted of keeping a house of ill fame, and appeals to this court. Affirmed.Leo C. Percival, for appellant.

Chas. W. Mullan, Atty. Gen., Lawrence De Graff, Asst. Atty. Gen., and W. S. Cooper, Co. Atty., for the State.

DEEMER, J.

The contentions for defendant are: (1) Error of the court in rejecting certain evidence; (2) insufficiency of the testimony to support the verdict; and (3) error in the instructions given by the trial court.

As to the ruling on evidence. Defendant sought to show what one of the inmates of her house said when she went there, to which an objection as incompetent was sustained. The witness was afterwards permitted to answer the question without objection, and no prejudice resulted from the ruling, even if erroneous. In answer to the question she affirmed that nothing was said, and both she and the inmate gave testimony as to the reason why she was there. Without setting forth the testimony, it is sufficient to say that there was enough to take the case to a jury. There is testimony other than the reputation of the house to support the charge; and, as the crime can seldom be proved by direct evidence, the inferences to be drawn from the facts and circumstances shown were for the jury.

2. The instruction complained of reads as follows: “Prostitution is the common lewdness of a woman for gain, or the offering of her person to indiscriminate intercourse with man; while lewdness is unlawful indulgence of the animal desire. In determining the question whether said house was resorted to for the purpose of prostitution or lewdness, you are authorized to consider as shown in the evidence the character of the women, if any, resorting or repairing to said house, the conduct of the men visiting the said house, and times they went to said house, their length of stay, and any other facts or circumstances, if any, tending to show why men and women resorted to said house, if you find any did resort to it. To authorize a conviction it is not necessary or incumbent upon the state to show that the defendant kept the house in question as a house of ill fame for the purpose of gain, the statute does not make that a necessary element of the crime, and it is not necessary to prove it.” It has support in the following cases: State v. Toombs, 79 Iowa, 141, 45 N. W. 300;State...