Sprinkles v. Commonwealth

Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976)

Decided December 11, 1945

Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976) · decided 1945-12-11

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““It was also error to instruct the jury to find the appellant guilty, if they believed that she had liquor in her possession for sale in local option territory, because the indictment made no reference to this offense.””

quoted by 1 later decision, including Spears v. Commonwealth

Relies on Johnson v. Commonwealth · Thomas v. Thomas

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1945-12-11

How this case has been cited

Cited by 4 later decisions — most recently February 1966

4 state decisions

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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¶1 Opinion of the Court by

Judge Cammack

¶2 Reversing

¶3 *162 Mae Sprinkles was charged with selling liquor in local option territory. Upon her trial she was found guilty and her punishment fixed at a fine of $60 and 30 days in jail. She has moved this Court for an appeal, which is granted, because we believe the judgment of conviction to be erroneous.

¶4 The name of the person to whom the appellant was alleged to have sold the liquor was not set out in the descriptive part of the indictment, nor was it stated that the name of the person was unknown. This was a fatal defect. Johnson v. Commonwealth, 299 Ky. 72, 184 S. W. 2d 812, and cases cited therein.

¶5 It was also error to instruct the jury to find the appellant guilty, if they believed that she had liquor in her possession for sale in local option territory, because the indictment made no reference to this offense.

¶6 Judgment reversed, with directions to set it aside, and for proceedings consistent with this opinion.