United States v. Kojima

2 D. Haw. 12
CourtDistrict Court, D. Hawaii
DecidedJanuary 5, 1904
StatusPublished

This text of 2 D. Haw. 12 (United States v. Kojima) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Hawaii primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Kojima, 2 D. Haw. 12 (D. Haw. 1904).

Opinion

Dole, J.

The first ground assigned for the motion is that “said indictment charges a conspiracy to commit no offense “known to the law.”

The first count of the indictment charges a conspiracy “to “foster, maintain, carry on and conduct at Honolulu in the “District aforesaid, the crimes of adultery and fornication contrary to the statutes etc.” and to collect from each of the [13]*13prostitutes engaged in said Honolulu ■ in the commission of the aforesaid crimes of adultery and fornication the sum of ten dollars per month for the furtherance of such enterprise, and that the defendants did collect such money for such purpose.

The second count similarly charges a conspiracy with the exception that the defendants should, instead of collecting such moneys, each pay ten dollars a month to' certain persons to the Grand Jurors unknown for the furtherance of such enterprise, and that they did in fact each pay ten dollars to certain persons to the Grand • Jurors unknown, for such purpose.

The third count charges the carrying out of the object of the conspiracy.

The defendants’ counsel contends that the description of the offense which the indictment charges as the object of the conspiracy, is not an offense known to the .laws of the United States in that it does not charge a conspiracy to commit the crimes of adultery and fornication, but “with conspiring to “become possible accessories before the fact,” and questions whether there can be an accessory before the fact to the offenses of adultery and fornication because Section 5323 of the Revised Statutes defines an accessory to certain crimes on the seas not including these and the punishment therefor; and Section 5533 provides for the punishment of accessories after the fact to certain offenses not including those before us.

The fact that these two laws do not include all crimes under the statutes of the United States, does not, in my opinion, have the effect of excluding the usual rule as to accessories in regard to the crimes not mentioned in such laws. I think the case of U. S. v. Snyder, 14 Fed. Rep., 556, settles this point. The offense was one not included in the two sections of the Revised Statutes referred to. One of the defendants was held to be properly convicted as an aider, procurer and abettor, although he could not have been convicted as a principal in that, the crime was one that could only be committed by a postmaster.

[14]*14Can. persons be punished as accessories to the offenses of adultery and fornication ? I do not find that these are excepted from the general rule. There are numerous authorities which recognize the fact of aiders and abettors to the crime of rape.

The defendants’ counsel quotes the case of Shannon and Nugent v. Commonwealth, 14 Pa. St. 226, as authority for the contention that there can be no conspiracy to commit adultery or fornication. The decision was to the effect, as stated in the head note, that where consent is part of a criminal act, it is not a subject of indictment as a conspiracy to commit the act. This case contains an opinion in the nature of an obiter dictum admitting that a conspiracy to “dishonor a man and disgrace “his family by debauching his wife would be indictable.” This case has been quoted by more than one text book as authority for the rule that bigam y and incest may be objects of conspiracy.

If this conspiracy was carried out and certain parties as a result of its success should be indicted for adultery and fornication or either, could the defendants be joined as accessories ?

In People v. McKane, 143 N. Y. 464, before the New York Court of Appeals, the court said:

“He who by command, counsel or assistance, procures another to commit the crime is, in morals and in law as culpable as the actual visible actor himself, for the reason that the criminal act, whatever it may be, is imputable to the person who conceived it and set the forces in motion for its actual accomplishment.”

The defendants contend that the description of the offense which it is charged they conspired to effect, does not define a crime within the federal statutes, and that ai conspiracy to “foster, maintain, carry on and conduct” or “have carried on “and have conducted” (as the second count modifies the description), such crimes, in other words, conspiring to become accesssories thereto, is not within the statute, and that the description does not define a statutory crime.

The statutes of the United States provide a punishment for adultery and fornication. The indictment defines such statutory [15]*15crimes as the object of the conspiracy and charges, in effect, the defendants with conspiring to become accessories thereto.

In Pettibone v. U. S., 148 U. S. 203, the court says:

“A conspiracy is sufficiently described as a combination of two or more persons, by concerted action, to accomplish a criminal or unlawful purpose * * * and the rule is accepted as laid down by Chief Justice Shaw in Com. v. Hunt (4 Met. 111) that when the criminality of a conspiracy consists in an unlawful agreement of two or more persons to compass or promote some criminal or illegal purpose, that purpose must be fully and clearly stated in the indictment.”

The words used by Chief Justice Shaw in Com. v. Hunt (4 Met. 123) are as follows:

“A conspiracy must be a combination of two or more persons, by some concerted action, to accomplish some criminal or unlawful purpose.”

In Re Coy, 127 U. S. 755-756.

The conspirators may combine to accomplish the unlawful purpose themselves, through a part of their number or to procure its accomplishment by others, and will be liable in each of such cases, otherwise conspiracies could safely be entered into for the promotion of any and all crimes so long as the conspirators agree to refrain*, from the actual commission thereof, but to procure others to act for them.

The second ground of the motion to quash is that “said indictment, if charging a conspiracy to commit any offense “known to the law, is bad for duplicity, in this, that in each “and every count of said indictment a conspiracy to commit two “separate and distinct offenses is charged.” These two offenses are adultery and fornication, and the essential part of each is illicit intercourse. Indictments may charge both adultery and fornication and the jury may find the defendants guilty of either.

Wharton, Section 383, State v. Cowell, 26 N. C. 231; Dinkey v. Commonwealth, 17 Pa. St. 126, 130.

[16]*16The third ground of the motion is as follows: Because said indictment is tod vague, general, insufficient and uncertain to afford said defendants proper notice to plead and establish their defenses, and this is in violation of the sixth amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which provides that in all criminal prosecutions the accused shall have the constitutional right “to be informed of the nature and the cause of the- accusation against” him.

In the case of the United States v. Wilson, 60 Fed. Rep. 894, the court said, on a motion for a new trial:

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Bluebook (online)
2 D. Haw. 12, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-kojima-hid-1904.