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77 Pa. 470

Wright v. Commonwealth

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania

Decided March 8, 1875

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania · decided 1875-03-08

163. This was an indictment found at the April Term 1871, against Jonathan Wright, that he “ did unlawfully and maliciously carry on and about (his) person, a certain concealed deadly weapon, commonly called a pistol, with intent, with the pistol aforesaid, unlawfully and maliciously, to do bodily harm to some other person, to the inquest unknown, &c.” The defendant pleaded “Not guilty.” The jury found the defendant “Not guilty, the defendant to pay the costs.” ' The…

Cited in Anderson (1889)’s definition of “Aeraign” · Bouvier (1914)’s definition of “Arms”

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1875-03-08

How this case has been cited

Cited by 12 later decisions — most recently March 2021

11 state decisions

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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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¶1Judgment entered in the Supreme Court,

Per Curiam.

¶2This indictment is for the offence of unlawfully *471and maliciously carrying upon the person of the defendant, a concealed deadly weapon, to wit, a pistol, with an intent, unlawfully and maliciously, to do bodily harm to another, contrary to the Act of 5th May 1864, section 1, 1 Brightly 323, pi. 40. Such an unlawful act and malicious intent as this has no protection under the 21st section of the Bill of Rights, saving the right of the citizens to bear arms in defence of themselves and the state.

¶3The objection to the imposition of costs, on the ground that a verdict of not guilty was rendered, is equally futile. We must presume the jury had a good reason for doing so, arising in the conduct of the defendant. And even if the indictment had been so defective that no conviction could have rested upon it, still the right to impose costs existed. This jvas expressly decided, and good reasons stated for the decision, in the Commonwealth v. Tilghman, 4 S. & R. 127.

¶4Sentence of the Quarter Sessions for the costs affirmed.

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