{ "id": 8662502, "name": "STATE v. W. L. GRIFFIN", "name_abbreviation": "State v. Griffin", "decision_date": "1917-12-22", "docket_number": "", "first_page": "767", "last_page": "770", "citations": [ { "type": "official", "cite": "175 N.C. 767" } ], "court": { "name_abbreviation": "N.C.", "id": 9292, "name": "Supreme Court of North Carolina" }, "jurisdiction": { "id": 5, "name_long": "North Carolina", "name": "N.C." }, "cites_to": [ { "cite": "125 Wis., 650", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Wis.", "case_ids": [ 8703585 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/wis/125/0650-01" ] }, { "cite": "10 Ind., 355", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ind.", "case_ids": [ 1484823 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ind/10/0355-01" ] }, { "cite": "45 L. R. A., 473", "category": "reporters:federal", "reporter": "L.R.A.", "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "119 Ga., 709", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ga.", "case_ids": [ 422716 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ga/119/0709-01" ] }, { "cite": "52 La. Ann., 1921", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "La. Ann.", "case_ids": [ 301242 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/la-ann/52/1921-01" ] }, { "cite": "65 Ore., 178", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Or.", "case_ids": [ 2353939 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/or/65/0178-01" ] }, { "cite": "26 S. D., 426", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "S.D.", "case_ids": [ 5379480 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/sd/26/0426-01" ] }, { "cite": "191 Ill., 305", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill.", "case_ids": [ 3244903 ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill/191/0305-01" ] }, { "cite": "168 Ill., 175", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill.", "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "166 N. C., 248", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.C.", "opinion_index": 0 } ], "analysis": { "cardinality": 499, "char_count": 7653, "ocr_confidence": 0.439, "pagerank": { "raw": 3.605183918810053e-07, "percentile": 0.8879247400138001 }, "sha256": "586ad3804c957d652e7d9797ff23dadefc53d16be8b0954cf6a325188ac0051d", "simhash": "1:a0e2b43105608d25", "word_count": 1357 }, "last_updated": "2023-07-14T19:50:36.007196+00:00", "provenance": { "date_added": "2019-08-29", "source": "Harvard", "batch": "2018" }, "casebody": { "judges": [], "parties": [ "STATE v. W. L. GRIFFIN." ], "opinions": [ { "text": "Beown, J.\nThe evidence for the State tends to prove that defendant offered Jimmie Mustian, a-boy nine years of age, five dollars to go with him into a neighboring corn field in the suburbs of Henderson and let defendant have intercourse with the boy by the mouth. The boy went with defendant, who took the boy\u2019s penis in his mouth and continued the act for about five minutes, when he desisted. He did not pay the boy, who complained of the offense.\nThe defendant\u2019s evidence tends to prove that he is fifty-two years of age and has a wife forty-two years of age, that they have seven children from twenty-seven to seven years old, that he has been a man of good character, except for getting drunk, and has never been accused or suspected of such crime before this.\nThe defendant testified \u201cthat he was drunk that afternoon and the only recollection he had after about 3 o\u2019clock was of lying on the ground in the cornfield in the dark, and of a boy \u2018peeing\u2019 in his face; and that the next thing he knew was on coming to himself in the jail; that he had never done such a thing as he was accused of.\u201d\nThe defendant at the close of the State\u2019s testimony, and again at the close of all the testimony, demurred and asked his Honor to hold: (1) \u201cThat the crime is not complete upon the testimony, since the law contemplates the insertion of the private parts of the defendant into the person of the pathic or other party to make out the crime, and that the insertion of the penis of the boy into the mouth of the defendant does not constitute the crime. (2) That the statute and the nature of the case require that to constitute the crime the party of the second part must be capable of an emission, which a boy of nine years is not.\u201d\nThe motion was denied and the defendant excepted.\nWe think the demurrer was properly overruled. The statute reads as follows: -\u201cIf any person shall commit the abominable and detestable \u2022crime against nature with mankind or beast, he shall be imprisoned in the State\u2019s Prison not less than five nor more than sixty years:\u201d Revi-sal of 1905, sec. 3349.\nThe statute does not define the crime against nature, but it has been done by the courts, and in declaring what indecent and unnatural acts come within the denunciation of the law, the courts have differed to some extent, as pointed out by Mr. Justice Allen in S. v. Fenner, 166 N. C., 248. In that ease it is held that having carnal knowledge of a man by inserting the sexual organ of the defendant in his mouth is an indictable offense under the statute.\nThe only difference in that case and this is that this defendant took the boy\u2019s penis in his mouth and undertook by that unnatural and indecent method to gratify a perverted and depraved sexual instinct. We think the one method is as much a crime against nature as the other.\nWhile the crime against nature and sodomy have often been used as synonymous terms, our statute is broad enough to include in the crime against nature other forms of the offense than-sodomy and buggery. It includes all kindred acts of a bestial character whereby degraded and perverted sexual desires are sought to be gratified. The method employed in this case is as much against nature, in the sense of being unnatural, indecent, and against the order of nature, as sodomy or any other bestial and unnatural copulation. It is the identical act for which the accused was convicted in Honselman v. The People, 168 Ill., 175, which is cited and approved in Kelly v. The People, 191 Ill., 305.\nUnder a statute similar to ours the Supreme Court of South Dakota declared that the words crime against nature not only included the common-law crime of sodomy, but any kind of unnatural copulation by the mouth or any other kind of unnatural carnal copulation. S. v. Whitmarsh, 26 S. D., 426.\nAnother case exactly on all fours with the one at bar is S. v. Start, 65 Ore., 178, where the Court also holds that both parties and all who are present aiding and abetting the act are guilty.\nS. v. Vicknair, 52 La. Ann., 1921, holds that the act committed with the mouth is included in the \u201ccrime against nature,\u2019.\u2019' and that it is immaterial which of the parties committed it. \u201cWhether he was agent or pathic is immaterial. Even those who are present aiding and abetting the offense are all principals.\u201d Other pertinent cases are Herring v. S., 119 Ga., 709; Glover v. S., 45 L. R. A., 473 (Ind.); Ausman v. Veal, 10 Ind., 355; S. v. Means, 125 Wis., 650.\nThe second ground of demurrer is also untenable. It is not necessary that the boy should have attained the age of puberty so as to be capable of an emission. Such a construction of the law would permit such degrading practices to be carried on with impunity with those whose tender years and inexperience render them ignorant of their evil effects. Tbe statute aims to protect tbe young and innocent as well as to punisb tbe hardened criminal wbo seduces them into sucb filthy and detestable conduct.\nDefendants counsel contended and argued to tbe jury and asked tbe court to charge that tbe crime being a sexual one, would naturally appear and be practiced by defendant, if at all, soon after attaining puberty, and in youth and in young manhood, and that one guilty of it would naturally be averse to matrimony and to woman and to tbe natural relations of tbe sexes; and that tbe defendant having married in bis youth and reared a large family would constitute evidence to be considered by them and in defendant\u2019s favor and in support of bis denial that be bad been guilty of tbe crime charged. This prayer could not well be given. It assumes certain facts and conditions to be true which are matters in evidence and solely for tbe consideration of the jury. These matters were properly argued to tbe jury and tbe defendant bad tbe full benefit of them. It was for tbe jury and not tbe judge to draw tbe proper inferences from and give tbe proper weight to them.\nWe regret that tbe importance of this question, covering as it does a matter wherein tbe courts of other States are in conflict, renders it necessary to soil tbe pages of our reports with tbe discussion of a subject so disgusting.\nTbe learned and humane judge wbo tried this case seems to have been impressed by tbe defendant\u2019s evidence that be was so drunk that be was unconscious of tbe act charged against him, for be imposed tbe minimum sentence of tbe law.\nIt is to be deplored that there is no minimum punishment for tbe defendant\u2019s unfortunate wife and children. Their sufferings cannot be mitigated.\nNo error.", "type": "majority", "author": "Beown, J." } ], "attorneys": [ "Attorney-General Manning and Assistant Attorney-General Sylces for the State.", "T. T. Hichs for defendant." ], "corrections": "", "head_matter": "STATE v. W. L. GRIFFIN.\n(Filed 22 December, 1917.)\n1. Criminal Law \u2014 \u201cCrime Against Nature\u201d \u2014 Statutes.\nThe unnatural gratification of the passion by one of mature years with the mouth is punishable within the meaning of \u201ca crime against nature\u201d under the provision of Revisal, sec. 3349, though the pathic be a youth of 9 years before reaching the age of puberty.\n2. Same \u2014 Instructions\u2014Requests\u2014Trials\u2014Questions for Jury.\nUpon trial of defendant for the \u201ccrime against nature\u201d of matured years and married and with children, a special request which assumes as a fact that such unnatural intercourse would more likely occur when the defendant was developing into manhood is properly refused, this being for the determination of the jury.\nINDICTMENT for committing the \u201ccrime against nature\u201d under section 3390, Revisal, tried before Whedbee, J., at October Term, 1917, of Yance.\nThe defendant was convicted and sentenced to five years in the State\u2019s Prison. From the verdict and judgment defendant appeals.\nAttorney-General Manning and Assistant Attorney-General Sylces for the State.\nT. T. Hichs for defendant." }, "file_name": "0767-01", "first_page_order": 821, "last_page_order": 824 }