State v. Wallen

• Decision Date: 03 October 1913
• Docket Number: 18,188 - (9)
• Citation: 143 N.W. 119,123 Minn. 128
• Parties: STATE v. HENNING WALLEN
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

143 N.W. 119

123 Minn. 128

STATE v. HENNING WALLEN

Nos. 18,188 - (9)

Supreme Court of Minnesota

October 3, 1913

Defendant was indicted for the crime of incest, tried in the district court for the county of McLeod before Morrison, J and a jury, and convicted. From an order denying defendant's motion for a new trial, he appealed. Affirmed.

SYLLABUS

Conviction sustained by evidence.

In a prosecution for incest it is held that the evidence is sufficient to support the verdict of guilty, and that the record presents no reversible error.

C. G. Odquist, for appellant.

Lyndon A. Smith, Attorney General, Alonzo J. Edgerton, Assistant Attorney General, and W. O. McNelly, County Attorney, for respondent.

OPINION

BROWN, C.J.

Defendant was duly convicted of the crime of incest and appealed from an order denying a new trial.

Defendant is 65 years of age, and a widower, his wife having died a year or two prior to the date of the crime charged in the indictment. Complainant is defendant's daughter and of the age of 25 years. She was a married woman, but her husband had deserted her prior to the date in question, and she was residing with and keeping house for her father, the defendant. The indictment charges defendant with having intercourse with this daughter on March 21, 1912. The evidence supports the charge, and also shows that unlawful intercourse took place between the parties on several other occasions prior to that date, all of which occurred within a period of a year and four months. The daughter testified to the fact of intercourse, against her will, though her resistance appears not to have been of a character to make the charge one of rape. Defendant took the stand as a witness in his own behalf and explicitly denied the charge made against him.

1. It is contended that the testimony of complainant of acts of intercourse prior to the date relied upon for conviction was too remote and erroneously admitted. It is not contended that evidence of other acts of intercourse was inadmissible, (State v. Schmeller, 120 Minn. 26, 138 N.W. 937), but that the other acts were too far removed from the date charged to serve as corroboration, and only tended to prejudice the jury against defendant. In this we do not concur. In a prosecution of this character it seems clear that prior acts of intercourse extending over the period of time here disclosed, and under the circumstances presented, constitute potent and persuasive corrobative evidence, and tend strongly to affirm the truth of the specific charge. If the relation between the parties had been of this character for a year and four months, the inference is strong that it so continued until interrupted by the arrest and prosecution on the specific charge. We affirm the admissibility of the evidence.

2. It is contended that the evidence is insufficient to justify the conviction of defendant, in view of the rule of reasonable doubt. This contention is not well founded. The evidence offered by the state, the testimony of the daughter, was, if believed by the jury, amply sufficient to warrant them declaring defendant guilty. The record presents no fact or circumstance tending to discredit the witness,...