State v. Fong Wee

275 P. 1112, 47 Idaho 416, 1929 Ida. LEXIS 121
Idaho Supreme Court·Decided March 30, 1929·No. No. 5243.·Published·Cited by 3 cases

Opinion

BUDGE, C. J.

Appellant was charged by information with a violation of the provisions of Sess. Laws 1923, chap. 60, p. 68, an act—

“Making it unlawful to practice any system or method of treating the sick or afflicted, other than by religious ministrations, without having a license issued by the state; mak *418 ing it unlawful to use certain professional names or abbreviations, and prescribing penalties therefor.”

Demurrer to the information was overruled, after which appellant entered a plea of not guilty and was tried and convicted. Motion in arrest of judgment was denied. This appeal is taken from the judgment of conviction.

The principal question here is whether the information was defective, appellant’s contention being that it was duplicitous as charging more than one offense. The information charged a violation of secs. 1 and 2 of the act above referred to, following substantially the language of the statute, and the difference between the positions taken by appellant and the state is whether these sections, considered together, set forth one or two crimes. That more than one offense is charged in an information or indictment is ground for demurrer, and motion in arrest of judgment may be founded on any of the défects in the information or indictment that are grounds for demurrer, unless the objection has been waived by failure to demur. (C. S., secs. 8812, 8870, 9019.) Sections 1 and 2 of chap. 60, supra, provide:

“Section 1. It shall be unlawful for any person, or persons, to practice or attempt to practice, or to advertise, or hold himself or themselves out as practicing, any system or mode of treating the sick or afflicted, either man or beast, in this state, or to diagnose, treat, operate for, prescribe for, any disease, injury, deformity, or other mental or physical condition of any person, or animal, for a fee or compensation of any kind either directly or indirectly, without having at the time of so doing a valid unrevoked certificate or license issued by the state of Idaho to perform or prescribe such service.
“Sec. 2. It shall be unlawful for any person or persons to hold himself or themselves out as practicing any system or mode of treating the sick, or the afflicted, man‘or beast, or in any sign, or in any advertisement use the words ‘doctor’ or ‘professor,’ or the letters or prefix ‘Dr.’ or ‘Prof.’ or any other term or letters indicating or implying *419 that he is a doctor, physician and surgeon, or practitioner, without having at the time of so doing a valid unrevoked certificate or license granted by the state of Idaho to perform or prescribe such service.”

We think it is apparent from a reading of these two sections in connection with the title of the act, also quoted hereinabove, that it was the legislative intention to make all or any of the acts designated in section 1 an offense, and all or any of the acts designated in sec. 2 another or additional offense. If it were otherwise, it would not have been necessary in the title to set out that the acts covered by the two sections were each made unlawful, nor is it likely each of the sections would have provided for the necessity of having a license or certificate issued by the state in order for a person or persons doing any of the things therein set out not to be subject to prosecution.

It is contended by the state that chap. 60 was taken from the Medical Practice Act of California, sec. 17 (Cal. Stats. 1913, p. 734; Henning’s General Laws of California, p. 1719), and we are urged to apply the rule, found in Black on Interpretation of Laws, p. 597, that:

“If the legislature of a state, in enacting a statute, literally or substantially copies the language of a statute previously existing in another state, or borrows from such statute a provision, clause, or phrase, the same having received a settled judicial interpretation in the state of its origin, it is presumed that the enactment was made with knowledge of such interpretation, and that it was the design of the legislature that the act should be understood and applied according to that interpretation.”

The state next directs attention to the case of People v. Rutledge, 172 Cal. 401, 156 Pac. 455, wherein the supreme court of California held an information containing the averment that the accused “did willfully and unlawfully practice, attempt to practice and advertise and hold himself out as practicing a system and mode of treating the sick and afflicted in the state of California without then and there having a valid, unrevoked certificate authorizing him to *420 practice a system or mode of treating the sick and afflicted in this state from the board of medical examiners of the state of California,” sufficiently charged a violation of sec. 17 of the Medical Practice Act (Stats. Cal. 1913, p. 734) and was not open to the criticism that it sought to impute many offenses to defendant because any one of the acts or omissions averred and conjunctively pleaded would suffice as the basis of an information.

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State v. Fong Wee, 275 P. 1112, 47 Idaho 416, 1929 Ida. LEXIS 121 (Idaho 1929).

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