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58 Ind. 587

Evans v. State ex rel. Rinert

Indiana Supreme Court

Decided November 15, 1877

Indiana Supreme Court · decided 1877-11-15

<p>Bastakdy.—Practice.—Minor Defendant.—New Trial.—Guardian ad Litem. —The failure of the court to appoint a guardian ad litem, for a minor defendant, who ’is being prosecuted for bastardy, is not cause for a new trial.</p> <p>Same.—Supreme Court.— Waiver.—Assignment of Error.—Where no objection is made by such defendant, in the court below, to the failure of the court to appoint a guardian ad litem, and no assignment thereof as error is made on appeal, no question relating thereto is presented to the Supreme Court.</p> <p>Same.—Still-Born Bastard.—The fact that, after verdict against the defendant in a prosecution for bastardy, but before judgment, the bastard is born dead, is no reason why judgment should not be rendered against the defendant for whatever sum seems just to the court.</p>

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1877-11-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 15 later decisions — most recently December 1980

15 state decisions

30187718801890190019101920193019401950196019701980decided

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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Biddle, C. J.

¶1Prosecution by the State, on the relation of Ann M. Rinert, against the appellant, for bastardy.

¶2Trial by jury and conviction.

¶3It was shown to the court, that the prosecutrix, after verdict and before judgment, was delivered of her child, which was born dead. Over a motion for a new trial, and exceptions reserved, the court adjudged that the appellant should pay the prosecutrix one hundred dollars. A motion in arrest of judgment was overruled, and exceptions reserved. Appeal.

¶4The appellant makes the following points in the record, and discusses them in his brief:

¶51st. That the verdict is not sustained by the evidence.

¶6We think it is. The prosecutrix testifies that the appellant is the father of the child, giving time, place and circumstances. The only evidence against her statement, if it is against it at all, is the testimony of a mid-wife, to whom the the prosecutrix applied for something that “ would bring on her monthlies.” The mid-wife told her “ to get some whiskey and saffron and take regularly of it; and, if her menses had ceased from taking cold, this would bring them on, but, if she had got with child, it would not.” She said she guessed it was “from cold.”

¶7*589The evidence fairly sustains the verdict.

¶82d. That the verdict is contrary to the evidence.

¶9This is sufficiently answered under the first proposition.

¶103d. That the appellant was a minor at the time of the trial, and no guardian ad litem was appointed for him, to defend the suit.

¶11No such objection was taken before trial, no exception reserved, and no such question raised by an assignment of error.

¶12The first appearance of this objection in the record is its assignment as a cause for a new trial. It is not such an error, if an error at all, as can be assigned as a cause for a new trial. It is not an error occurring at the trial, and granting a new trial would not correct it. It is therefore not before us.

¶134th. That the child was not living at the time the judgment was rendered.

¶14It was not necessary that the child should have been alive at the time the judgment was rendered. See sections 1, 19 and 20, of “An act regulating prosecutions in cases of bastardy.” 2 R. S. 1876, p. 654.

¶15Notwithstanding the death of the child, it was the duty of the court, on conviction, to give judgment for such sum as should be deemed just. Section 20, supra.

¶16It has not been made to appear to' us, that the amount adjudged by the court was improper.

¶175 th. The motion in arrest of judgment is not discussed in the appellant’s brief, and we can find no ground to sustain it.

¶18The judgment below is affirmed, with costs.

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