Court Opinion

ID: 6662235
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-20 21:03:02.364541+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:00:12.708408
License: Public Domain

Sedgwick, J.,
dissenting.
The crime of rape is one of the most detested of crimes. It is a crime against the virtue of womanhood. “The object of the statute is to protect the virtuous maidens of the commonwealth, to protect those girls who are undefiled virgins; and a female under 18 years of age and over 15 years of age who has been guilty of unlawful sexual intercourse with a male is not within the act.” Bailey v. State, 57 Neb. 706. If this young girl was previously chaste and was ruined by this defendant, he richly deserves the punishment for rape which the statute provides may be 20 years in the penitentiary. If she was not a pure girl, the crime which this defendant has committed, if he has done the act charged, is principally in degrading himself and indirectly injuring his wife and children. That crime is not rape; it is adultery, and the punishment is a short term in the county jail. When the crime of rape is committed against a girl under the age of consent, the substance of the crime is the violation of her chastity, and must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. “Where the prosecutrix is over 16 years of age at the time of the alleged commission of the crime, the evidence should show, beyond a reasonable doubt, that she was not previously unchaste.” Burk v. State, 79 Neb. 241. The prosecuting witness, when she was asked the direst leading question by her attorney, said that she was not previously unchaste.. The opinion makes a feeble attempt to show that she was corroborated as to the act itself, but there is no intimation in the evidence or in the majority opinion that she was corroborated as to' her purity. “Unless she committed perjury, she was not previously unchaste. Evidence to that effect is not disputed in the record.” This is all that is said in the opinion on this subject. There is such a great, such an immeasurable distance between a pure girl *473and one who has trifled away or has been robbed of her virtue, that the law may well punish him who deliberately plans to destroy her by the extreme penalty. It is presumably just and reasonable that the gravamen of such a crime should be proved so as to remove all reasonable doubt of the guilt of the man charged. If it is required that the prosecuting witness should be corroborated in any particular, there is greater reason to require it upon this issue than upon any other. Generally, a wanton girl will not hesitate to swear to her own purity. When she yields her virtue, she yields all, and rarely retains a high regard for truth. If truthful, she is generally virtuous, and vice versa,. A virtuous girl- is known by all her acquaintances to be virtuous. It is no hardship to require conclusive proof. A wanton woman advertises that fact by her conduct and demeanor wherever she goes.
There is not only no corroboration as to the chastity of the girl, but also a total failure of corroboration as to the act itself. Everything named in the opinion as corroboration is equally consistent with innocence as with guilt. Morrison and his family were not in the habit of going to Norden every Saturday. It was only occasionally that they did so. They would be more likely to take the girl with them than to leave her at home alone. The defendant was as much in the habit of driving Saturday as were they. He and the Morrison family were old-time acquaintances and friends. The fact that defendant drove out of his way to go to Morrison’s is equally consistent with innocence on his part. That he remained there in the storm until Morrison returned and did not go to Nor-den, that he visited with -the family, and conversed with the girl for an hour “in the vestibule opening into the kitchen,” furnishes no corroboration. They passed the evening in the usual social manner, and at about 10 o’clock Mr. Morrison asked the defendant to stay for the night. He declined, saying that he must be at home in the morning early to care for his stock. Mr. Morrison then announced that he would retire for the night. Mrs. Morri*474son started at once for their room at the head of the stairs, and Morrison followed her within a minute or two. Within five or ten minutes thereafter the defendant left for his home. In the meantime it is alleged that this crime was committed. The lights were burning, the doors were open, and considerable noise in any part of the little house could he heard throughout the building. The details of the commission of the alleged crime in those five or ten minutes are given solely by the prosecutrix, and this testimony of hers can, of course, furnish no corroboration of itself. Twice during the evening and after the two children had retired, Mr. and Mrs. Morrison- went out of the house, and were gone one or two minutes; once when it was thought an automobile in which they were interested was passing, and once to close the door of the chicken house a couple of rods distant, and on one of these occasions the defendant and the girl were standing in the hall talking. The defendant had left his hat and gloves in the sitting-room, and he testifies that when Morrison declared that he would retire for the night the girl Avent into the sitting-room to get his (defendant’s) hat and gloves for him, and he followed through the hall door which was left open, and could not at once find his hat and gloves, which delayed him possibly five minutes, and as soon as they secured his hat and gloves he went home.
In all this there is no proof of a single fact that tends to prove a disposition on his part to commit such a crime. Proof of opportunity alone without indication of any improper conduct will, of course, not amount to corroboration. The proof of opportunity is not sufficient. The evidence of Mr. and Mrs. Moiwison shoAvs that, when Morrison announced that he would retire, it amounted to an invitation to defendant to either stay for the night or go, and defendant acted accordingly. He started at once for his hat and gloves, and Morrison says he had left the house Avithin five or ten minutes. Was a chaste and virtuous girl ruined in those five or ten minutes? Neither *475the act itself nor the chastity of the girl is proved beyond a reasonable donbt.