Case ID: mass_113/html/0457-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Morton, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Commonwealth vs. Thomas Thornton.
    An indictment alleging that the defendant, “ having the charge and custody of a certain animal, to wit, a dog, did then and there knowingly and wilfully authorize and permit said dog to be subjected to unnecessary torture, suffering and cruelty, by then and there knowingly and wilfully suffering and permitting said dog to be bitten, mangled and cruelly tortured by a certain other dog,” charges with certainty and without ambiguity an offence under St. 1869, c. 344, § 2.
    Indictment alleging that Thomas Thornton, “ having the charge and custody of a certain animal, to wit, a dog, did then and there knowingly and wilfully authorize and permit said dog o be subjected to unnecessary torture, suffering and cruelty, by men and there knowingly and wilfully suffering and permitting said dog to be bitten, mangled and cruelly tortured by a certain other dog.”
    Before the jury was empanelled and sworn, and before trial, the defendant made in the Superior Court a motion to dismiss the indictment, upon the grounds that no offence known to the law was therein set forth, and that the offence intended to be charged therein was not fully, plainly and substantially set forth.
    
      Pitman, J., overruled the motion, and the defendant, after conviction, alleged exceptions.
    
      
      J. H. Brown, for the defendant.
    
      C. R. Train, Attorney General, for the Commonwealth.
   Morton, J.

The indictment alleges, in the words of the statute, that the defendant, having the charge and custody of a dog, did “ knowingly and wilfully authorize and permit said dog to be subjected to unnecessary torture, suffering and cruelty.” St. 1869, c. 344, § 2. It further alleges that he did this by '‘ knowingly and wilfully suffering and permitting said dog to be bitten, mangled and cruelly tortured by a certain other dog.” The indictment thus alleges, with certainty, and without ambiguity, the acts charged against the defendant, and we have no doubt these acts constitute an offence within the spirit and. letter of the statute. Exceptions overruled.