Court Opinion

ID: 9808436
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 20:38:13.214899+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:12:29.839884
License: Public Domain

Ashe, J.,
dissenting. After a careful consideration of the case, I find myself unable to concur with the majority of the court in the views expressed in the opinion of my brother RuffiN.
The indictment charges the defendant with having destroyed the public peace by assaulting and beating one of its citizens.
It is not a qúestion between the assailant and the injured party ; so far as they are personally concerned, the injuries may be redressed by a civil action. But it is a question between the government and the citizen, and when the crime charged in the indictment against the defendant is for an assault and battery which was committed on another, at the same time and place, and with the same instrument and the same stroke or blow, the transaction is one and not divisible. It is one offence against the state, and the state cannot split the one crime and prosecute it in its parts ; and therefore when the defendant has been tried and acquitted by a court of competent jurisdiction of the assault and battery on one, it may be pleaded in bar of a prosecution for the assault and battery upon the other.
The decisions on this subject I find to be contradictory, but I think the weight of the authorities support my conclusion. I am sustained in the position by the following :
In the State v. Lindsay, Phil., 468, this court held that where one was indicted for an assault and battery, and it was found that .in a former indictment against him and others, the assault charged against him was given in evidence with other acts of like character, his conviction of the riot was a bar to the second prosecution.
*655In Wilson v. State, 45 Tex., 76, it was decided that the stealing of different articles of property belonging to different persons, at the same time and place, is but one offence against the state, and that the accused cannot be convicted upon separate indictments, charging defendant with parts of one transaction as a distinct offence. A conviction on one of the indictments bars a prosecution on the other.
To the same effect is Addison v. State, 3 Tex., (Court of App.,) 40; Hudson v. State, 9 Tex., (Ib.) 151; Jackson v. State, 14 Ind., 327; State v. Williams, 10 Humph., 101; Lorton v. State, 7 Miss., 55.
In State v. Egglisht, 41 Iowa, 574, where the defendant had delivered at-the same time and by the same act to the teller of a bank four forged checks, which purported to have been drawn by four different parties, it was held that this constituted but one offence of uttering forged checks, and that a couviction for uttering.one of the checks was a bar to a conviction for uttering the others. In Indiana it has been decided that where the same act results in the death of two or more, and the person committing the act is convicted or acquitted on a trial for the indictment for. the murder of one, he cannot be indicted for the murder of the other, when the evidence offered on the last trial is the same and in no wise different from that employed on the trial of the former indictment,.and the crimes charged in the two indictments are identical in all their parts, incidents and circumstances. Clem v. State, 42 Ind., 420.
The case more directly in point is that of the State v. Damon, 2 Tyler (Vermont), 390. The defendant was there indicted for an assault and battery upon one Miller and pleaded “ former conviction ” on an indictment for an assault and batter-yon one -Doty/allegingthat the wounding of each was by the same stroke and at the same time. The court said in its opinion: “It appears the defendant wounded two persons in the same affray, at the same time *656and with the same stroke. On a regular complaint made, he has been convicted before a court of competent jurisdiction for assaulting, beating and wounding Frederick Miller, one of those persons. He stands here indicted for assaulting, beating, and wounding Elias Doty, the other of those persons, and the defendant pleads in bar the former conviction which' he alleges to be for the same offence. The only question is, whether the defendant has been already convicted of the offence charged in the indictment. Of this there can be no doubt, for it is apparent on the record, that the assault and battery charged in the indictment, and that of which he was convicted by Mr. Justice Randall, were at the same piace and in the same affray, and the wounds made by the same instrument and by the same stroke. This is not a question between either of the persons injured by the assault and battery and their assailants; redress has or may be obtained by them by private actions. But it is a question between the government and its subject, and the court are clearly of opinion that the indictment cannot be sustained.”
But it is said, in the opinion of the majority of the court that that case is not authority, and has been so declared by Bennett and Heard in their notes to their Leading Oases; and that it is also said by the annotator of Archbold PL and Pr. to be against the weight of authority. It is the opinion of three commentators against that of the supreme court of Vermont. So far as the weight of the authority is concerned, I prefer to stand by the court.
The case of Rex v. Vandercomb is cited as authority for the position, that unless the defendant could have been convicted upon the first indictment, upon proof of the facts, not as brought forward in the evidence, but as alleged in the record of the second indictment, the plea of former conviction could not avail him. Can that be law ? In many cases it would be impossible to ascertain, except by the evi*657dence, whether the offences are the same, where there are different indictments for offences that are of the same character and grade. Suppose A, for instance, is indicted jointly with B, for an assault on C, and both are convicted, and af-terwards A is indicted for the same assault, the record would not show that fact; and unless he were permitted to show the fact by proof, he would be twice convicted for the same offence. The evidence must necessarily be admitted, and such, according to my experience, has been the practice in this state.
The principle which is enunciated in State v. Damon, I think is sustained by the case of the State v. Town of Fayetteville, 2 Mur., 371, where the defendants were indicted for not keeping the streets of the to\vn in repair, and three or four streets were presented on the same indictment, it was held the defendants should be indicted but once for all; if separate bills be found, on a conviction on one, it might be pleaded in bar to the others, and in the opinion delivered by Chief Justice Taylor, he concluded by saying: This notion of rendering crimes, like matter infinitely divisible, is repugnant to the spirit and policy of the law, and ought not to be countenanced.” The case of the State v. Merritt, Phil., 134, (cited and relied upon in the opinion of the court,) I do not think is in conflict with the authorities I have above cited. It only decides that an indiscriminate assault upon several is an assault upon each, but does not go the length of holding that separate indictments would lie for an assault upon each. All I think that is to be inferred from that decision, is, that being an assault upon each, the solicitor might make his election and indict for the assault upon any one of them.
I am of the opinion that there was no error in the judgment of the superior court.
Per Curiam. Error.