United States v. Palan

• Decision Date: 18 February 1909
• Citation: 167 F. 991
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. PALAN et al.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

167 F. 991

UNITED STATES v. PALAN et al.

United States Circuit Court, S.D. New York.

February 18, 1909

Henry L. Stimson, U.S. Atty.

Isadore L. Pascal, for defendants.

HOLT District Judge.

This is a motion in arrest of judgment. Defendants have been indicted and convicted of a violation of section 3 of the immigration act of 1907 (Act Feb. 20, 1907, c. 1134, 34 Stat. 899 (U.S Comp. St. Supp. 1907, p. 392)). The material portion of that section is as follows:

'That the importation into the United States of any alien woman or girl for the purpose of prostitution, or for any other immoral purpose, is hereby forbidden; and whoever shall directly or indirectly, import, or attempt to import, into the United States, any alien woman or girl for the purpose of prostitution, or for any other immoral purpose, * * * or whoever shall keep, maintain, control, support, or harbor in any house or other place, for the purpose of prostitution, or for any other immoral purpose, any alien woman or girl, within three years after she shall have entered the United States shall, in every such case, be deemed guilty of a felony, and on conviction thereof be imprisoned not more than five years and pay a fine of not more than five thousand dollars.'

The indictment contained four counts. The first count charged the defendants with importing into the United States a certain alien woman for the purpose of prostitution. The second count charged the defendants with keeping and harboring such woman in a certain house in the city of New York for the purpose of prostitution within three years after she entered the United States. The third count charged that the defendants imported such woman for an immoral purpose, to wit, concubinage. The fourth count charged that they kept and harbored her in said house for such immoral purpose. The jury found the defendants guilty under the second count only. The verdict, therefore, establishes that the defendants kept and harbored such woman in a certain house for the purpose of prostitution within three years after she entered the United States.

The defendants proved on the trial that they were arrested while living at such house, and while keeping there such alien woman, and were charged before the Court of Special Sessions of New York with the offense of keeping a disorderly house. The defendant Esther Palan pleaded guilty, and was sentenced to one month's imprisonment. The defendant Samuel Palan pleaded not guilty, was tried, convicted, and sentenced to six months' imprisonment. The defendants served their respective terms. The defendants' counsel, on the trial herein, moved to direct the jury to acquit on the counts for keeping and harboring, on the ground that they had already been convicted and punished for that offense in the state court. I denied the motion at the trial, stating, however, that if the jury convicted the defendants of keeping and harboring I would take the question under consideration on a motion in arrest of judgment. Such motion has now been made.

It is well settled that every citizen of the United States is a citizen of two sovereign governments, the state in which he lives and the United States, and that certain acts may constitute an offense under the laws of each government. Fox v. Ohio, 5 How. 410, 12 L.Ed. 213; U.S. v Marigold, 9...