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141 Mass. 238

Moyle v. Drake

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court

Decided February 26, 1886

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1886-02-26

Tort for malicious prosecution. Writ dated March 1, 1884. Trial in the Superior Court, before Bacon, J., who reported the case for the determination of this court, in substance as follows; Drake, on August 25, 1883, made a complaint before a trial justice, charging Moyle with wilfully committing a trespass, on August 13, 1883, and unlawfully and wilfully cutting down, carrying away, and destroying three hundred trees, of the value of $30, of the property of Drake.

Relies on Cardival v. Smith · Driggs v. Burton · Fay v. . O'Neill

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1886-02-26

How this case has been cited

Cited by 13 later decisions — most recently April 1933

13 state decisions

60188618901900191019201930decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Field, J.

¶1The defendant made a complaint before a trial justice against the plaintiff, under the Pub. Sts. c. 203, § 94, on which the plaintiff was arrested, and, after an examination by the trial justice, was discharged. This section of the Public Statutes is a reenactment of the Gen. Sts. c. 161, § 81, as *242amended by the St. of 1868, c. 321, § 1. By § 2 of the latter statute, jurisdiction to punish this offence was given to trial justices concurrently with the Superior Court, “ when the value of the property cut, .... or the injury occasioned by the trespass, is not alleged to exceed the sum of one hundred dollars.” It seems that, by the Pub. Sts. a. 155, § 51, this grant of jurisdiction to trial justices over offences under this section of the statutes was omitted, and that, since the Public Statutes took effect, they have jurisdiction only to commit or bind over for trial in the Superior Court those who, on complaint, appear to be guilty of offences under this section. But this change in the law is immaterial. A discharge by the trial justice is an end of the prosecution, and the prosecution was before a court having some jurisdiction over the offence. Sayles v. Briggs, 4 Met. 421, 426. Cardival v. Smith, 109 Mass. 158. Driggs v. Burton, 44 Vt. 124. Fay v. O’Neill, 36 N. Y. 11.

¶2There was evidence for the jury that the complaint was prosecuted without probable cause, and with malice.

¶3New trial granted.

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