Opinion ID: 2101095
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Negativing the Exceptions in the Statute

Text: It has been broadly stated that if an exception appears in the enacting clause of a statute, it has to be averred in an indictment founded on the statute by means of language negativing the exception,that the accused was not within the exception. 41 Am.Jur., 2d Indictments and Information § 98, and State v. Godfrey, 24 Me. 232. This rule expresses the description theory of pleading recognized in State v. Webber, 125 Me. 319, 322, 133 A. 738 where the Court said: (W)here a statute defining an offense contains an exception    in the enacting clause which is so incorporated with the language describing and defining the offense that the ingredients of the offense cannot be accurately and clearly described if the exception is omitted, an indictment founded on the statute must allege enough to show that the accused is not within the exception. Courts which follow this description theory also generally hold that an exception which happens to be located outside the enacting section is not essentially descriptive of the offense. 41 Am.Jur.2d supra § 99. (W)here the language of the statute defining the offense is so entirely separable from the exception that the ingredients constituting the offense may be accurately and clearly defined without any reference to the exception, the pleader may safely omit any such reference, since the matter contained in the exception is a matter of defense, which must be established by the accused. 41 Am.Jur.2d, Indictments and Informations § 98. Such holding expresses the location theory of pleading recognized in State v. Gurney, 37 Me. 149, 155 where the Court said: But when the exception or proviso is in a subsequent enacting clause, the case provided for in the enacting clause may be fully stated without negativing the subsequent exception or proviso.    (I)t is for the party for whom matter of excuse is furnished by the statute, to bring it forward in his defense. Guerney was followed in State v. Boyington, 56 Me. 512, 514 and State v. Skolfield, 86 Me. 149, 152, 29 A. 922, where the rule was even more clearly reiterated, and most recently in Toussaint v. State, Me., 262 A.2d 123, (Opinion filed February 19, 1970). Here in § 2362 was a general prohibition against the possession of narcotic drugs. Classes of persons exempted from the prohibition were establihed in other parts of the chapter. It was appellant's responsibility by pleading to bring himself within an excepted class. The procedural desirability of limiting negative pleading had been adopted in our Rule 7 [2] M.R. Crim.Proc., which rule is: (I)ntended    to eliminate the necessity of negativing statutory exceptions, unless the exception is so inseparable a part of the definition of the offense that it cannot be accurately described if the exception is omitted. Rule 7, Reporter's Notes, Page 66 and Discussion § 7.9, Maine Practice, Glassman. Pleading to negative the status of the accused as within any class of persons freed from the prohibition of the statute was not necessary. Appeal denied.