Case ID: njl_12/html/0107-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "By the Court.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

*Job Jones vs. Caleb Pitman.
    CERTEORARI.
    The action below was a qui tam action brought by Caleb Pitman, as well for the overseers of the poor of the township of New Hanover, in the county of Burlington, as for himself, to recover a penalty under the “ Act for the preservation of game, and to prevent trespassing with guns,” passed the 21st December, 1771. Judgment was rendered by the justice in favor of the prosecutor, and the following entry was made on the docket: “ I give judgment in favor of the prosecutor for the sum of six pounds, equal in value to sixteen dollars of debt, and two dollars and fifty cents costs. The defendant immediately paid the debt, and I paid the prosecutor one-half of the debt, and Daniel Emley, overseer of the poor of the township of New Hanover, the other part.”
    There was an appeal from this judgment, to the Common Pleas of Burlington county, who affirmed the judgment, and thereupon the present certiorari was brought.
    
      Wall, for the plaintiff in certiorari,
    relied upon the following reason for reversal, viz : The judgment should have been that the prosecutor recover one moiety to his own use, and the other moiety to the use of the overseers of the poor of the township of New Hanover.
    
      Sims and W. Halsted, contra.
   By the Court.

The Court of Common Pleas merely affirmed the judgment of the justice, which is improper, being that the prosecutor recover the whole sum, instead of the one-half for himself and the other half for the overseers of the poor. Therefore let the j udgment be reversed.