Case ID: nys_65/html/0717-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "McADAM, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

In re DEMPSEY.
    (Supreme Court, Special Term, New York County.
    July, 1900.)
    Seduction—Complaint—Corroboratory Evidence.
    Pen. Code, § 286, which provides that there can be no conviction for seduction under promise of marriage on the unsupported testimony of the female seduced, does not require the formal complaint which initiates the prosecution to be supported by evidence other than that of the complaining witness, since the statute refers only to a rule of evidence in the trial and conviction of such offenders.
    Habeas corpus by Thomas J. Dempsey for discharge from confinement on a charge of seduction.
    Writ dismissed.
    Ambrose H. Purdy, for petitioner.
    Asa Bird Gardiner, Dist. Atty., for the People.
   McADAM, J.

The prisoner was arrested on the charge of seducing the complainant under promise of marriage. Pen. Code, § 284. The complaint charges every fact necessary to make the crime complete. The law requiring the complainant to be corroborated (Id. § 286) is a mere rule of evidence relating to the trial and conviction of such offenders, and in no manner pertains to the formal complaint which initiates the prosecution. Indeed, the corroboration may be by circumstantial evidence. Boyce v. People, 55 N. Y. 644; State v. Brinkhaus (Minn.) 25 N. W. 642; State v. Hill (Mo. Sup.) 4 S. W. 121.

Writ dismissed, and prisoner remanded.