True v. Hunter

174 Iowa 442
CourtSupreme Court of Iowa
DecidedFebruary 19, 1916
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 174 Iowa 442 (True v. Hunter) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Iowa primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
True v. Hunter, 174 Iowa 442 (iowa 1916).

Opinion

Gaynor, J.

This is an action in certiorari to test the legality of the action of defendant in fining plaintiff for contempt of a liquor injunction. It appears that, on the 26th day of August, 1914, a decree of injunction was duly entered, perpetually enjoining and restraining this plaintiff from the illegal traffic in intoxicating liquors on the premises described in the complainant’s petition and elsewhere in the judicial district; that this decree, thereafter, and at the time of the commencement of the contempt proceedings, was in full force.1 and effect, with the full knowledge of the plaintiff. On the" 19th day of June, 1915, an'information was filed before the [443]*443defendant judge, charging the plaintiff with a violation of said injunction. The judge thereupon ordered a warrant to issue for the arrest of the defendant (this plaintiff), and he was brought in on the same day to answer the charge. He answered, denying all the allegations of the complaint. On the 21st day of June, 1915, the cause was heard before said judge, and he found the plaintiff herein guilty of contempt, as charged. The plaintiff was thereupon fined and ordered committed to the jail until the fine was .paid, not to exceed the statutory time. He sued out the writ to test the legality of said action.

1. Intoxicating liquors: injuction: contempt: evidence. The contention here is that the evidence submitted to said judge did not justify the finding that the defendant (this plaintiff) was in contempt of court, and did not justify the court in assessing a penalty as for contempt. The burden was on the State to prove the charge made, to wit, that the defendant in said proceedings (plaintiff herein) did in fact violate the injunction, as alleged in the complaint.

The evidence tends to show that the defendant is a married man, and resides in what is known as No. 616 West Mechanic Street; that he is a man of leisure and dresses well; that he has not been working at anything for over a year; that, prior to the issuance of the injunction against him, he had been in the saloon business, connected with the saloon business; that he was engaged in the liquor business with Dennis Maloney up to about the 21st day of June, 1914. Dennis Maloney resides at the corner, and in what is known as No. 602 West Mechanic Street. Mrs. Ennis, referred to in the testimony, lives at No. 608 West Mechanic Street, and owns the lot at No. 612. On the rear end of plaintiff’s lot is a barn. On the .rear end of Mrs. Ennis’s lot, at No. 608, is an old unoccupied shed.

[444]*4442. Intoxicating liquors : presumption : liquors in private residence. [443]*443On the Friday .preceding the trial, the chief of police of the city and another officer made a search of plaintiff’s resi[444]*444dence,- and found a sackful of beer there at the head of the stairs entering the cellar. They searched the house and cellar, but found nothing further. They were informed by Mrs. True, plaintiff’s wife, that the beer belonged to her; that she was in ill health and she kept it for her own private use. The finding of this beer in the residence of the plaintiff raised no presumption that it was kept for sale in violation of law. See Section 2427 of the Code of 1897, which reads:

“The finding of the same in unusual quantities in a private dwelling house or its dependencies of any person keeping a tavern, public eating house, grocery or other place of public resort, shall be presumptive evidence that such liquors are kept for illegal sale. ’ ’

The plaintiff comes within none of the inhibited classes.

After searching the house, these officers say they saw a path leading from plaintiff’s barn over through Mrs. Ennis’s yard, that had been recently raked with a rake; that it had rained the night before; that they found the raked tracks up across Mrs. Ennis’s yard, across No. 612 to the yard where she resided, at No. 608. These rake tracks led to an old, unoccupied building on the back of Lot 608. There appears to have been nothing that looked like liquor in the room of this old house; but at the back of this building on 608, they found a door on hinges, raised it up, and found 31 sacks of beer, each sack containing about 24 bottles. This old place was not occupied by anyone. It was an old building on the rear end of Mrs. Ennis’s lot, at No. 608. We take it, it was standing in or near the alley back of her home. The tracks they followed from plaintiff’s house in reaching this extended from a barn on the rear end of plaintiff’s lot to this shed in which beer was found. The search was made about two o’clock in the afternoon. There is no evidence that plaintiff was ever seen in the vicinity of this building.

[445]*445There seems also to be a vacant building on Mrs. Ennis’s lot at No. 612. About three or four weeks previous to the search hereinbefore referred to, these officers found, in the old building at No. 612, in the cellar, 11 boxes of beer. There is evidence that men were seen drinking beer on the railroad track in the rear of these lots. Just before this first search was made, these officers “saw fellows sitting on the railroad dump along up on top of the bank near the track; these fellows came up the track, and two men went back' to Dennis Maloney’s place, — that is, No. 602, — and right back to Mrs. Ennis’s place, 608-612, and the two men stopped down near the dump with two bottles of Golden Grain Belt beer, and when they saw the officers, they left and left some of the beer behind them”.

It appears that the bottles found in plaintiff’s house were in a burlap sack, and contained Golden Grain Belt beer; that the beer found in the old house at the rear end of Mrs. Ennis’s lot was in the same kind of a sack and was the same kind of beer. It appears also that there is another path running from Dennis Maloney’s house back of Mrs. Ennis’s house. This path is farther down in the rear of the lots. It is not far from the railroad track. It starts about 50 feet inside of the right of way, and the witness says that this is the path that had been recently scratched over with a rake.

The officer with the chief gave substantially the same testimony. He gave the further testimony that when he was up there, the day before the search was made, he saw indications of persons drinking in the vicinity. We take it from his fimther testimony that this refers to the fellows seen by the chief drinking beer on the railroad track. He further testifies:

‘11 have seen persons carrying packages up in that vicinity, not around Pearl’s place, but on the railroad track. I don’t know where they came from. They were no nearer to True’s place than the other houses in the street. The persons I saw drinking beer on the track were in the rear of Mrs. [446]*446Ennis’s property. I didn’t see the plaintiff there at any of the times that the searches were made, but he has the reputation of being a bootlegger.”

One Smith testified that he was on the police force, and that he was up in the vicinity of the plaintiff’s place and saw the plaintiff at Dennis Maloney’s about 12:30 at night; that there was a sack of beer in the room plaintiff was in.

“He (plaintiff) said he was putting some on ice to cool for Sunday, or something like that. I told him I had a notion to call the wagon and take him and the sack of beer down and lock them up.

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Related

State v. Lewis
216 P. 337 (Montana Supreme Court, 1923)
State v. Bertinelli
183 Iowa 1143 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1918)

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Bluebook (online)
174 Iowa 442, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/true-v-hunter-iowa-1916.