Commonwealth v. Cook
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
The defendant was indicted on St. 1845, c. 216, <§> 1, which enacts that “ any person, who shall fraudulently and deceitfully entice or take away any unmarried woman, of a chaste life and conversation, from her father’s house, or wherever else she may be found, for the purpose of prostitution, at a house of ill fame, assignation, or elsewhere,” &c. “ shall be punished,” &c.
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The defendant was indicted on St. 1845, c. 216, <§> 1, which enacts that “ any person, who shall fraudulently and deceitfully entice or take away any unmarried woman, of a chaste life and conversation, from her father’s house, or wherever else she may be found, for the purpose of prostitution, at a house of ill fame, assignation, or elsewhere,” &c. “ shall be punished,” &c. The trial was in the court of common pleas, before Wells, C. J. whose report thereof was in substance as follows: The evidence tended to prove, among other things, that from November 1844 to September 1845, the defendant…
1Opinion of the CourtDewey, J.
We are called upon to give a legal construe tion to the St. of 1845, c. 216, upon questions reserved in a case presenting painful details of grossly immoral acts, and open violations of the divine law. Such cases are not the *95most favorable for a dispassionate consideration of questions of law, the decision of which involves the question whether the party shall be punished, or be discharged as not guilty of any offence cognizable by our laws. But cases of gross immorality do, from time to time, occur, in which the court feel constrained to say that the acts complained of are not punishable…
2Cited by6 opinions
- Prout v. StateCourt of Appeals of Maryland · 1988
- Bailey v. United StatesCourt of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit · 1938
- Commonwealth v. LaverySupreme Court of Pennsylvania · 1915
- Goldsborough v. WashingtonSupreme Court of Virginia · 1911
- State v. AndersonSupreme Court of Missouri · 1920
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