Warren sheaf. [volume] (Warren, Marshall County, Minn.) 1880-current, 1881-09-10
Queer Verdicts.

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Queer Verlicts.
How may one explain the odd verdicts |
that are rendered? Often the sum found |
seem inexplicible. Lately Patterson jury,
in an aggravated breach Of promise case,
found for the lady" damages, $8,337'' and |
inquiry arose, naturally enough. whence
the 81? Are jury's scales for weighing |
wounded affections SO delicate as that!"
One who has become cenversant with the |
interior methods of the jury -roem will say /,
that the sum may be not precise valuation |
in which each juror concurred, but an aver |
age OF twelve various estimates. Probably |
the jury first voted on the general question.
"For plaintiff or defendent?" Finding all |
were in favor of some damages to the plain
tiff, they reached an amount by each man
writing a sum on slip of paper, casting all
in hat, adding them, and dividing the
total by twelve. It is contrary to law for
Jurors to agree beforehand that they will re-
port an average of their several sums as the
verdict; but the law cannot prevent their
taking IN average to see how it strikes
them, and then, if all approve it, reporting
it, and they often do so. If the sums on
twelfth or average, would be So 1887.
Preposterons convictions are so netimes
reached by this Willingness to com romise
opinions rather than be kept out" longer.
A Connecticut wife was prosecuted for
killing her husband by slow poisoning,
and the !ury-after long deliberation--
found her guilty .of murder in the second
degree. Now, the second degree of m ur-
der embraces the more hasty, passionate,
undeliberate kinds. The first degree COM
prises the deliberate, premeditated cases,
to which class poison eminently belongs.
1t is not probable that any one juror really
considered that a finding Of murder IN the
second degree was correct. More likely
a woman to be hanged; and the others,
rather than allow proved prisoner to have
a chance of escape, which would be allow
ed her by disagreement and new trial,
consented to unite in saying Second de
gree" and SO securing imprisonment for
life.
1t is fortunate that bad spelling or false
grammer does not vitiate; for there are
many stories of blunderivg verdicts. But
is there not the maxim, FGlsa grannnaaticu
NON vitiat, hGec olim meminis sc jauvbit,
sed retrogradare, hoe opus est. The re-
vised version of which is: Grammatical
faults are not vicious; it will amuse us to
remember them afterward; but to correct
OAoA tAo10 tAO 1uDs 1AuoS III y AuWouAV
for COW, the jury returned: "We, the
jury, find the COW in the plaintiff" The
judge, as gravely as might be, told the clerk
to help them to write it. but the clerk could
devise no better forms than these: "You
say that you find the plaintiff in the cow"
you say that you find the property of the
COW in the PLAINTIFF" etc., The judge at
last, had to draft the verdict himself. In a
horse case the jury made return: 'We,the
jury, find the value of the horse to be $780,"
The court said this would not dc at ALL
What the law wished to know was not SO
much what the horse was worth as to whom
itbelonged.
At the end of an English trial for false
pretenses, the jury said: I'VE find he do
wrong, but we recommend him to mercy"
The judge asked, somewhat tartly, whether
they found the prisoner guilty, and they
answered.: Net guilty, but we recon-
mend him to mercy" This naturally rails
ed laugh in the courtroom, after which
the Judge explained that their finding was
equivalent to an entire equittal, which was
at length recorded. On trial for larceny,
the jury came back complaining that they
could not agree whether the offense wa.
grand" or ''petty" until instructed wheth-
er to value the goods at wholesale or at re-
tail prices. Said the judge: Gentlemen
considering inc way the RASCAL cAluo ny Uuo
goods don't think the court can afford to
wholesale them to him." Verdict Of grand
larceny Immediately. In some states the
jury decide the punishment as we'll as the
offense, hence, in murder case, an illit.
crate foreman wrote the verdict, City,
deth."
Why find q verdict for such silly sum
as 6 IA cents? Sometimes such finding
may be really valuable. Say that people
are in the habit of crossing your meadow.
and you fear that if they persist in doing
so for term of years that footpath will
become matter of right. If, now you sue
some one person for trespessing and recos-
or IA cents, this will show, at any time
after, that the meadow was yours, and the
townspeople crossed it by suffrence only.
Often, however, a nominal verdict means
that, though the defendent was legally in
fault, the jury disapprove the plaintiffs
suit.
The Place Where They Shoot the Appar
tus Out ola Cannon to the Fire.
When inquired Writes Chicagoan in
London) why the steamers are 80 small he
replied: "Becos we cawnt get bigger one
to a fire." ''Why not?" "Osses can't pull
q bigger one than this ere. An wots more,