State v. Chapin

delivered tbe opinion of tbe Court.

This was an indictment for arson, determined in tbe Phillips Circuit Court.

Adams Ghapin, with John N. Cummings, William H. Holland and others, was charged with the burning of the steam-boat Martha Washington on tlie Mississippi river, in tbe county of Phillips, on the 14th January, 1852. In some of the counts in the indictment, Ghapin was charged as principal, and in others, as accessory before the fact.

He filed the following plea to the indictment:

“And the said Adams Chapin, &c., &c., &c., saith that the court here ought not to take cognizance of the pijson…