The San Francisco call., 1895-07-20
him loose without even the injunction for

him loose without even the Injunction fol
him to go and sin no more.
1t was an imperfect complaint that re
suited in the discharge of Frank Dessola
much to the chagrin of the officers of tht
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty tc
Animals, and also of the Police Court anc
Superior Court Prosecuting Attorneys thai
figured in the case.
The crime of driving glandered horse
is very serious one, for the glanders is 6
CONTAGIOUS disease and readily com.
municated to man. A person who
drives a glandered horse through the
streets makes it unsafe to water g
healthy animal at public trough. The
diseased animal is also a menace to all
who come within reach of his poisonous
breath, laden, as it is with unseen myriads
of deadly bacteria.
Frank Dessola' crime was even worse
than this. He peddled fruit and vege-
tables from door to door with glandered
horse, and from careleSSnesS most OF the
fruit was infected. So much was proven
in the Police Court and scarcely denied by
the defendant.
w. T. Hooper, an officer of the society,
was the prosecuting witness. The society
proved that last summer it went to Des-
sola's stables and forced him to kill a
horse named Dick, that was afflicted with
the CHAMBERS. The society warned Des-
his stables. Dessola refused to do this,
but kept on housing his fruit wagons and
stabling other horses in the same structure
where Dick had suffered and died.
The society kept watch of DessoIa' g
stables, and soon discovered that the horse
Bob had become diseased The society s
veterinary surgeon was sent to the stable
! ~ d.
Dessola was notified. He denied it. Officer
Hooper told him to let his own veterinary
surgeon decide. Dessola consulted a
veterinary, as suggested, and the latter
only confirmed the verdict of the society s
surgeon. Still Dessola drove the horse
Bob, peddling fruit from door to door.
Then, to be doubly sure, to prevent the
possibility OF miscarriage of justice in
the case, the society had two other
reputable veterinary surgeons examine the
horse, and these two corroborated the YER
dict of the previous surgeons.
Then DesSola was arrested upon q war
rant issued from Police Court 8. He
was tried and convicted in that court,
though his counsel, Attorney N. S. Writ,
fought the case desperately. An appeal
was taken to the Superior Court, where
affirmed and Frank Dessola went to the
County Jail to serve out his six months
term of Imprisonment.
Then the Supreme Court was petitioned
for writ of habeas corpus. The writ was
granted, returnable in Department 2 on
the 18th of this month. And when the
case came up before Justice McFarlane he
dismissed the defendant.
The only showing made in the case by
the defendant was the complaint in the
Police Court upon which his arrest was
based. He made no contention of inno-
cence in the Supreme Court. He merely
said, 1.-THE complaint is defective"
ut is," said Justice McFarlane. "You
are discharged"
The allegation made in Dessola's petition
was as follows:
That the said imprisonment, detention, con-
fnement and restraint are illegal, and that the
illegality thereof consists in this, to wit: That
said defendant of the age OF about 70 years was
convicted of misdemeanor in the Police
Court of said City and County and sentenced
by Judge thereof to SIX months i'm
prisonment in the County Jail of said
City and County for said crime, and said sem
tence and the judgment thereof was affirmed
on appeal to the Superior Court, and said
petitioner is informed and believes that the
complaint and charge does not state facts
sufficient to constitute public offense, q copy
OF which is hereby annexed.
The copy of the complaint upon which
Dessola's arrest was secured, shorn of its
prefacing legal verbiage, reads as follows:
Personally appears before me, this 23d day
OF January, A.. d. 1895, w. 7. Hooper, who on
oath makes complaint and deposes and says,
in the City and County of San Francisco, State
of California, the crime of misdemeanor, to
wit, using glandered horse, was committed,
to wit, by F. Dessola. who then and there did