Putnam patriot., 1915-06-04

violation of the fish and game laws, he ought to arrest. The answer Is ex- plicit tn alleging that defendant gave no orders. directions or advice to Day except "if the plaintiff refused to give up the body of said deer to place him under arrest" This advice Is uased merely on Dnys statement over the tele phone that plaintiff hnd the body in violation of the fish and game laws and refused to surrender it, fne basis of the advice IS not any illegality tn fact, but Day's opinion that there was illeRaiity in plaintiffs withholding the body. There is no allegation in the answer as to how plaintiff got the body. Nothing can5 be presumed to help out the answer, AZ every pleading Is to be construed strictly against the leader. Therefore we have, in sup port Of Days opinion that plaintiffs $ possession offended the fish and game laws, nothing more than the bare fact that plaintiff WIS in possession of the dead body, and would not give 1t up.
 The second defense in paragraph 7, alleges that Day, as fish and game warden, had power, without warrant, to arrest for the violation of any law relating to fish and game, and the law IS so. A GUS lJlo, cn. lzS, {.
 It Is therefore tair to understand that the request for advice, and the advice given, both related to arrest without warrant.
 Day had no authority to arrest, with or without warrant, for an illegal pos session of the body under any other law than that relating to dsh and game.
 Days powers, and the powers of the defendant, and the duty of the plnin tiff to surrender the body to Day,sif he had such duty, are ail statetory.
 The defendant, quoting the attorney generals letter, points out that any one may take wild deer, and own 1t when captured, unless the statutes otherwise provide.
 We should therefore look for what the fish and game statutes provide as as to carcasses of deer, and we find nothing.
 Public Acts of 1911, in chapter II, provide that no one shall hunt, kill, attempt to kill, chase, or take any deer, buck, doe, or lawn, with pro- viso in favor of an owner or lessee kill ling deer damage feasant. There is nothing about the possession of dead bodies of deer, and 1t does not seem to me to follow that, because the statute makes 1t crime to kill a deer, it by implication makes it crime to possess the dead body of deer, for the killing of which the possessor is not to blame. This is a criminal statute, and 1t is to be strictly construed. For illustration, suppose that some one criminalIy shoots and wounds deer which runs long distance, and falls dead in Af II. ff fe. I..t. cause he takes possession of the car cass, n criminal equally with the man who intentionally killed the deer? me unreasonable. The question Is not who has the title to the body, but whether the statute about fish and game makes a criminal Of every man who possesses deer's carcass.
 In tbs case there is no suggestion that plaintiff killed the deer, and hence there is nothing in the statute to render it illegal, or at any rate, criminal for him to possess the body of deer dead from some cause, which, as far as the pieadings which govern the present issue go, k absolutely un- known. Neither k there anything in the statute authorizing a game warden to take away any deers carcass which he may iind in anolher's possession. He must be able to show that the pos session is illegal, and merely to teie- phone so to the superintendent dots not make the possession Illegal. Upon the second defense nothing appears to justify the. arrest, and the demurrer thereto IS sustained upon the grounds therein stared.
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