Case Name: Reddin Collins v. The State
Court: Texas Courts of Appeals
Jurisdiction: Texas
Decision Date: 1878
Citations: 5 Tex. Ct. App. 37
Docket Number: 
Parties: Reddin Collins v. The State.
Judges: 
Reporter: Texas Court of Appeals Reports
Volume: 5
Pages: 37–38

Head Matter:
Reddin Collins v. The State.
1. Pleading — Averment on Time.—It is essential that the information. allege the commission of the offence at a time anterior to the filing of the information, and that the offence does not appear to be barred by limitation.
2. Information—Variance.—An information is void unless based upon a proper affidavit. In this case the affidavit charges the offence as committed in the year of our Lord 187, and the information charges it as committed in 1877. Held, that the variance is fatal, and goes to the foundation of the prosecution.
Appeal from the County Court of Hopkins. Tried below before the Hon. F. M. Bogers, County Judge.
C. Payne, for the appellant.
George Me Cormick, Assistant Attorney-General, for the State.

Opinion:
Winkler, J.
The information purports to be based upon the written affidavit of W. L. Coker, filed with the information, and charges an aggravated assault and battery upon the person of one John Gillum, alleged to have been ' committed " on the 13th of September, 1877." The affidavit of Coker charges an aggravated assault and battery by the accused upon one John Gillum, " on the 13th day of September, A. D. 187." Agreeably to the record, and by which we are bound to be governed, the offence stated in the affidavit was committed 1,690 years before that stated in the information.
The accused moved the court below to quash the affidavit and information, on the reason, among others, that "the pretended affidavit shows that the pretended offence was committed in the year of our Lord 187, and that the information is bad without an affidavit that shows when the charged offence was committed."
The motion to quash was overruled. This was error. The variance between the affidavit and the information is fatal, and goes to the foundation of this prosecution. An information is void unless based upon a proper affidavit. Dion v. The State, 3 Texas Ct. App. 435. Both affidavit and information- are indispensable. Gen. Laws 1876, p. 20, sec.. 8. Neither can be dispensed with. In fact, the affidavit is the leading process, and is the basis upon which the information rests. Blake v. The State, 3 Texas Ct. App. 149.
Because of a material variance between the affidavit and the information, and because the affidavit charges an offence barred by limitation, the judgment is reversed and this prosecution dismissed.
Reversed 'and dismissed.