Case ID: mass_73/html/0222-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "The Court", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Commonwealth vs. Charles W. Wallace.
    The provision of SL 1855, c. 215, § 34, that, in prosecutions for the sale of spirituous and intoxicating liquors, delivery in or from any building or place, other than a dwelling-house, “ shall be deemed prima facie evidence of a sale, and be punishable as such sale,” is constitutional, and applies to all cases of such prosecutions; but the presumption is liable to be rebutted by attending circumstances, or other facts.
    Complaint for an unlawful sale of spirituous and intoxicating liquor, in violation of St. 1855, c. 215, § 15. Trial in the court of common pleas before Sanger, J., who signed the following bill of exceptions:
    
      “ The district attorney relying upon the delivery of spirituous and intoxicating liquor, under the thirty-fourth section of said law, as prima facie evidence of sale thereof, the defendant requested that the jury might be instructed, that said section was unconstitutional; that said section applied only where a naked delivery was proved, without any accompanying circumstances ; that a delivery could not be punished as a sale, unless the defendant was indicted for such delivery under said section ; and that it was for the jury to judge whether said section was applicable to the case at bar.
    “ The judge refused to give each of these instructions; but instructed the jury that they were not the judges of the constitutionality of the law; that said thirty-fourth section was constitutional ; that if there was proved, beyond a reasonable doubt, a delivery of intoxicating liquor by the defendant from any building or place other than a private dwelling-house or its dependencies, it would be prima facie evidence of a sale, and would warrant a verdict of guilty; but that the circumstances under which the delivery was made might rebut the presumption, or the presumption might be rebutted by proof. The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and the defendant excepts.”
    
      N. St. J. Green, for the defendant.
    
      J. II. Clifford, (Attorney General,) for the Commonwealth, relied on Commonwealth v. Williams, 6 Gray, 1.
   The Court

Overruled the exceptions.