Howard v. State

131 N.E. 403, 191 Ind. 232, 1921 Ind. LEXIS 29
CourtIndiana Supreme Court
DecidedJune 2, 1921
DocketNo. 23,854
StatusPublished
Cited by57 cases

This text of 131 N.E. 403 (Howard v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Howard v. State, 131 N.E. 403, 191 Ind. 232, 1921 Ind. LEXIS 29 (Ind. 1921).

Opinion

Willoughby, J.

The appellant was tried by jury in the criminal court of Marion county, Indiana, upon an affidavit based upon §2466 Burns 1914, §2079 R. S. 1881, which reads as follows: “Whoever keeps a building, room, arbor, garden, booth, shed, .tenement or canal boat, wharf boat or other water craft, to be used or [234]*234occupied for gaming, or knowingly permits the same to be used or occupied for gaming, or whoever, being the owner of any building, room, arbor, garden, booth, shed, tenement or canal boat, wharf boat or other water craft, rents the same to be used or occupied for gaming, shall, on conviction, be fined not less than ten dollars nor more than five hundred dollars, to which may be added imprisonment in the county jail or workhouse not less than ten days nor more than six months.”

To the affidavit filed against him the appellant entered a plea of not guilty, and upon the trial of the issue thus made, the jury rendered a verdict of guilty, as charged in the affidavit- and that he be fined $10 and imprisoned on the State Farm for a period of thirty days. Judgment was rendered on this verdict and from such judgment appellant appeals and assigns as error that the trial court erred in overruling his motion for a new trial.

1. In appellant’s motion for new trial he alleges that the court erred in giving certain instructions to the jury and refusing to give certain instructions tendered by appellant and requested to be given, but in appellant’s brief, under the heading of "Propositions, Points and Authorities,” there is no discussion either of alleged errors in giving instructions or in refusing to give instructions. Any question which the appellant fails to support by points and authorities-in his brief is waived. Vandalia R. Co. v. Mizer (1916), 184 Ind. 680, 112 N. E. 522; Chicago, etc., R. Co. v. Ader (1915), 184 Ind. 235, 110 N. E. 67; Indiana Quarries Co. v. Farmer (1915), 184 Ind. 411, 110 N. E. 549; McMurran v. Hannum (1916), 185 Ind. 326, 113 N. E. 238; Powell v. Jackson (1916), 60 Ind. App. 597, 111 N. E. 208.

The only questions presented in appellant’s brief are the sufficiency of the evidence and alleged error in ad[235]*235mitting certain exhibits that were offered by the state and admitted in evidence. No objection is made by appellant to the sufficiency of the affidavit or to the form thereof, but in discussing the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the verdict'appellant insists that the affidavit charges two separate offenses and that in order to convict, it was necessary for the state to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was guilty of both of the offenses.

The charging part of the affidavit upon which the appellant was tried is as follows, to wit: “That Beverly Howard, late of said city, county and state on or about July 30,1919, at and in the city, county and state aforesaid, did then and there unlawfully keep a certain building to wit: 1118 E. 16th St., there situate, to be used and occupied for gaming and then and there unlawfully and knowingly permitted William Hall and others unknown to play at certain games for money and other articles of value.”

In Davis v. State (1885), 100 Ind. 154, the court in passing on a motion to quash an indictment in substantially the same form as the indictment in this case, and based upon a similar statute, said: “The purpose of the statute is to suppress gambling houses. If a person keeps a house to be used for gaming, he violates the statute, and may be convicted. If a person knowingly permits his house to be used or occupied for gaming, he, that far, makes it a gambling house, violates the statute, and may be convicted. In this sense, the of-fences are separate, and may be separately prosecuted. And yet, in another sense, the offenses constitute the one offence of violating the statute against gambling houses. And in this sense, as was said in the case of Sowle v. State, 11 Ind. 492, the offence of permitting the gambling is merged in the offence of keeping a gambling house.”

[236]*236In the same case, Davis v. State, supra, the court in. quoting from Byrne v. State (1860), 12 Wis. 577, says: “ ‘The rule is well settled that, where a statute makes either of two or more distinct acts connected with the same general offense and subject to the same measure and kind of punishment, indictable separately as distinct crimes when each shall have been committed by different person's or at different times, they may, when committed by the same person at the same time, be coupled in one count, as 'constituting altogether but one offense. In such cases the several acts are considered as so many steps or stages in the same affair, and the offender may be indicted as for one combined act in violation of law; and proof of either of the acts mentioned in the statute and set forth in the indictment will sustain a conviction. * * *’ ”

2. A statute often makes punishable the doing of one thing or another, sometimes thus specifying a considerable number of things. Then, by proper and ordinary construction a person who in one transaction does all, violates the statute but once, and incurs only one penalty. Yet he violates it equally by doing one of the things. Therefore the indictment on such a statute may allege, in a single count, that the defendant did as many of the forbidden things as the pleader chooses, employing the conjunction “and” where the statute has “or” and it will not be double, and it will be established at the trial by proof of any one. of them.. 1 Bishop, New Criminal Procedure §436.

3. In the instant case we hold that the offense of permitting gambling is merged in the offense of keeping a gambling house and that the allegation in the affidavit that the defendant “unlawfully and knowingly permitted William Hall and others unknown to .play at certain games for money and other articles of value” is surplusage and need not be proved [237]*237to sustain a conviction. Dormer v. State (1850), 2 Ind. 308; State v. Pancake (1881), 74 Ind. 15.

The appellant quoting from Hamilton v. State (1895), 142 Ind. 276, 41 N. E. 588, says: “Where the evidence leaves standing some reasonable hypothesis of innocence there can be no conviction, and when the record discloses that fact to the appellate tribunal, a judgment of conviction cannot be affirmed.” Hamilton v. State, supra, has been overruled by Lee v. State (1901), 156 Ind. 541, 60 N. E. 299.

4. In Lee v. State, supra, it is held that where the circumstances are of such a character that the jury might reasonably have drawn an inference of guilt of the accused, the question of guilt becomes one of fact for the determination of the jury and trial court and is not open to review on appeal. Where the circumstantial evidence in a case is of such a character that two conflicting inferences may be reasonably drawn therefrom, one favorable to, or tending to prove the guilt of the accused, and the other favorable to his innocence, then under such circumstances, it is not within the province of the Supreme Court to determine which inference ought to have controlled the jury.

In Deal v. State (1895), 140 Ind. 354, 39 N. E.

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Bluebook (online)
131 N.E. 403, 191 Ind. 232, 1921 Ind. LEXIS 29, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/howard-v-state-ind-1921.