Case Name: RITCHIE against SHANNON
Court: Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
Jurisdiction: Pennsylvania
Decision Date: 1828-11-01
Citations: 2 Rawle 196
Docket Number: 
Parties: RITCHIE against SHANNON.
Judges: 
Reporter: Reports of cases adjudged in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania (Rawle)
Volume: 2
Pages: 196–197

Head Matter:
[Chambersburg,
November 1, 1828.]
RITCHIE against SHANNON.
IN ERROR.
Damages for detention, are recoverable in a suit for a penalty, by the party grieved: but it is otherwise in the case of a common informer.
Writ of error to the Court of Common Pleas of Cumberland county.
Debt by John Shannon, the defendant in error and plaintiff below, against William Ritchie, the plaintiff in error, to recover the penalty of fifty dollars, for taking from the said Shannon excessive fees in a suit before the said Riichie, as a justice of the peace.. In the court ’below, judgment was rendered for the plaintiff for fifty dollars, the penalty, with six cents damages, and six cents costs.
Several errors were now assigned, but the only one noticed in the opinion of this court was, that the verdict was defective, it being contended, that there could be no damages for the detention of a penalty.
Penrose, for the plaintiff in error.
Carothers, contra.

Opinion:
The opinion of the court was delivered by
Gibson, C. J. —
None of the exceptions merit particular notice, but that which is taken to the form of the verdict.' In every sort of action, it has been almost a' universal practice to take the verdict in this form, arising no doubt from inattention; and for so very small a matter, we should not be astute to overturn a judgment. Perhaps the maxim de ¡minimis, might be applicable to it. Haply, we are relieved from difficulty in this'instance, by the decision in Norris v. Pilmore, 1 Yeates, 408, where it is shown, that a penalty given to the party grieved, accrues at the commission of the offence; and consequently, that there may be damages for detention; but that it is otherwise in the- case of a common informer, who has no interest before judgment. This decision is well founded in technical reason, and supported beside by good authority. The verdict, therefore, is unexceptionable in substance and in form.
Judgment affirmed.