State v. Height

59 L.R.A. 437, 117 Iowa 650
Supreme Court of Iowa·Decided October 23, 1902·Published·Cited by 107 cases

Opinion

McClain, J. —

1 The crime is charged to have been committed by having sexual intercourse with a female under the age of consent. The evidence tends to show that the prosecutrix, a child ten years of age, did not make complaint of the alleged outrage until about eleven days after its commission, and then, on examination by physicians, was found to be affected with venereal disease.. The prosecuting attorney claimed in his opening statement that he would be able to show that the defendant at the time of the alleged intercourse was afflicted with the same disease, which he might have communicated to prosecutrix at that time, and thereby produced in her the diseased condition which was found on such examination; and for the purpose of establishing this fact he called as witnesses certain physicians who had made an examination of defendant’s private parts while he was confined in jail under arrest for the crime charged, and found that he then had, or had recently had, the disease in question. It is contended for appellant that this physical examination- of him was made without his consent and against his protest, and, proper objections having been made to the introduction of the evidence, it is now argued, first, that the testimony of these physicians is with reference to a privileged communication. But it is enough to say in answer to this contention that the physicians were not consulted by defendant, and that no communications were made to them by the defendant in that capacity; nor did the defendant, even if-he submitted to the examination, do so with the idea that the physicians making it were acting as his physicians. The objection to the testimony that, it disclosed a privileged communication was not well [653] taken. People v Glover, 71 Mich. 303 (38 N. W. Rep. 874). In any event, the privilege is not available to defeat the punishment of crime. State v. Grimmell, 116 Iowa, 596.

2 It is further argued that the testimony related to a confession by the defendant which was not voluntary, and that the evidence should have been excluded for this reason. There is ample ground in the record for saying that, if the testimony did relate 'to a confession, then the confession was not so far. voluntary on the part of the defendant as to render it admissible. But defendant made no confession of guilt, nor admission that he was afflicted with the disease for which he was examined. And it has been well settled by decisions without conflict, from the earliest, rulings on the subject to the present time, that, even though a confession be involuntarily made, inculpating facts discovered by means thereof may be established against the defendant. Rex v. Warickshall, 1 Leach, 263; Rex v. Lockhart, Id. 386; Rex v. Griffin, Russ. & Ry. 151; Com. v. Knapp, 9 Pick. 496 (20 Am. Dec. 491); State v. Motley, 7 Rich. Law, 327. There is nothing, therefore, in the rule excluding involuntary confessions to prevent the physicians who made the examination of defendant’s person from testifying as to his condition with reference to having venereal disease.

3 But while the condition of defendant’s privates was not, on the one hand, a confession or an admission, nor, on the other hand, an independent circumstance discovered by means of a confession or admission, it is nevertheless necessary to inquire further as to the admissibility of the evidence thereof, in view of the fact that it appears without reasonable doubt from the evidence that defendant was compelled to submit to such examination, and was therefore compelled to furnish evidence against himself. The examination by physicians was made under the direction of the prosecuting attorney, and was at first resisted by defendant, who finally consented thereto, if at [654] all, only after he had been told by one of the officers who made the arrest, and who was present, acting under the ■direction of the county attorney, and in his presence, that the state had the right to require such an examination to be made, and that the defendant must submit to it. The showing is amply sufficient to indicate legal duress, and we must therefore inquire whether the evidence against defendant secured by such duress, and which could not have been secured otherwise, was admissible over defendant’s objection.

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State v. Height, 59 L.R.A. 437, 117 Iowa 650 (iowa 1902).

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