Case Name: Commonwealth vs. Celia C. Sliney
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1878-11-08
Citations: 126 Mass. 49
Docket Number: 
Parties: Commonwealth vs. Celia C. Sliney.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 126
Pages: 49–50

Head Matter:
Commonwealth vs. Celia C. Sliney.
Essex.
November 8, 1878.
Endicott & Lord, JJ., absent.
At the trial of an indictment on the Gen. Sts. c. 87, §§ 6, 7, charging the defendant with keeping and maintaining a certain tenement resorted to for prostitution and lewdness, a witness testified, against the defendant’s objection, that he had a conversation on the piazza of the house in question, with a girl; that the defendant was also at the same time out of doors, and from fifteen to twenty feet distant from him and the girl; that the girl spoke very loud, and solicited him to have criminal intercourse with her in the house, and stated that the price would be a certain sum, a portion of which she was obliged to pay the defendant. The judge instructed the jury that it was for them to say, upon the evidence, whether the defendant heard the conversation; and that, if they did not find she heard it, they were to disregard the evidence, it being outside of the house. Held, that the defendant had no ground of exception.
Indictment, on the Gen. Sts. c. 87, §§ 6, 7, charging the defendant with keeping and maintaining a certain tenement in Salisbury, resorted to for prostitution and lewdness.
At the trial in the Superior Court, before Putnam, J., it appeared that the defendant kept a house in Salisbury for the accommodation of visitors in the summer time. For the purpose of proving that the place was resorted to for the purposes of prostitution, a witness testified that he had a conversation on the piazza of the house, with a girl; and that the defendant was also at the same time out of doors, and from fifteen to twenty feet distant from him and the girl. There was no evidence as to what the defendant was doing. But the witness testified that, though he spoke in an ordinary tone of voice, the girl spoke very loud, and he thought the defendant heard it; that the girl solicited him to have criminal intercourse with her in the house, and stated that the price would be a certain sum, out of which she was obliged to pay two dollars to the defendant (calling her by name). The defendant objected to the admission of this conversation. But the judge admitted it; and instructed the jury that it was for them to say upon the evidence whether the defendant heard the conversation; and that, if they did not find she heard it, they were to disregard the evidence, it being outside of the house.
The jury returned a verdict of guilty; and the defendant alleged exceptions.
W. D. Northend, for the defendant.
C. R. Train, Attorney General, for the Commonwealth.

Opinion:
The Court
Overruled the exception.