Title: State v. Palmer

State: oregon

Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court

Document:

Affirmed October 17, 1962.
Warren A. Woodruff, Roseburg, argued the cause and filed a brief for appellant.
*301 Avery W. Thompson, District Attorney, Roseburg, argued the cause and filed a brief for respondent.
Before McALLISTER, Chief Justice, and SLOAN, O'CONNELL, LUSK and DENECKE, Justices.
AFFIRMED.
SLOAN, J.
Defendant was convicted of the crime of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. He appeals because the trial court did not sustain a demurrer to the indictment and did not allow defendant's motion for a judgment of acquittal.
The allegations in the indictment and the provisions of the applicable statute need be set forth. The indictment charged:
The statute read:
Defendant has claimed "that the indictment attempts to charge the crime in two forms" and was thereby defective. We cannot agree.
1, 2. The statute specifies three general kinds of conduct any one or all of which will constitute the crime of contributing. The crime may be committed by: 1. Causing a child to have become an actual delinquent; 2. Persuading a child to perform any act or follow a course of conduct that would cause it to become delinquent; or 3. Doing an act which manifestly tends to cause a child to become a delinquent. A given act could fulfill all three requirements or it might touch only one. An indictment which alleged conduct which included all of the proscribed acts would not be subject to demurrer for that reason alone. It could be particularly true in cases involving sexual delinquency, as in this case, that the persuasion, inducements or acts of *303 the agressor could take on the caste of all three of the statutory requirements.
The indictment returned in this case was not artfully prepared and is not a model. But it described the alleged crime "* * * in such manner as to enable a person of common understanding to know what [was] intended and with such degree of certainty as to enable the court to pronounce judgment, upon a conviction, according to the right of the case; * * *." ORS 132.540 (f).
It is necessary to mention State v. Casson, 1960, 223 Or 421, 354 P2d 815. In Casson we were confronted with an indictment that specified four distinct acts under a videlicet. The acts were committed on various occasions during a period of about three months. In Casson we held that:
In the instant case, following the videlicet, the indictment charges a continuing course of conduct occurring on one distinct occasion all of which, it was charged, was done to induce the alleged victim to follow a course of conduct that would cause him to become delinquent. We think the language of the indictment does not compel that it be read as delineating separate, distinct acts, as in Casson, but rather, a simultaneous, continuous course of conduct aimed at inducing this young boy to participate in unlawful practices.
The instant case is more properly governed by cases *304 such as State v. Laundy, 1922, 103 Or 443, 204 P 958, 206 P 290, wherein it was said:
It was not error to sustain the indictment.
3, 4. Defendant also claims that there was not sufficient evidence to sustain the conviction. The whole of the evidence presented conflicts in the testimony and inferences to be drawn from all of the evidence which required jury determination. In State v. Stone, 1924, 111 Or 227, 235, 236, 226 P 430, 433, Justice BURNETT gave careful admonition to judges that cases of this kind peculiarly present jury questions. His stated reasons have not been modified nor have they lost cogency. They are applicable to this case. What was said above about the whole of the conduct charged in *305 the indictment is applicable on this assignment as well. The jury could find that the evidence of all of defendant's conduct on the given afternoon, when it was alleged to have happened, was intended to induce the boy to participate in some act or acts of sexual perversion. The judgment must be affirmed.