UNITED STATES V. PKnUUE. 897 �imperfection în matter of form only, which Bhall not tend to tiie prejudice of the defendant." �Prior to the passage of this etatnte we -were more strict in the administration of the criminal procedure, aiid the defend- ant had a right to take advantage of many defects of mere form in an indictment, and indictments have been quashed on such grounds alone ; but now, so far as form ia conceirned, it shall not operate to the insufficiency of an indictment unlesa it be to the prejudice of the defendant. �The motion to quash is overruled. �Thereuppn oounsel for defendant filed a demarrer to the indictment and the court overruled that also. ���United States v. Peedot!. �{Dittriet Court, W. D, Pennsylvania. , 1880.) �i. IiTDiCTMENT — Pbbjuht. — A bill in equity was flled to restrain the defendant from infringing letters patent for improved methods of exploding torpedoes in oil wells, to inorease the production thereof, etc.; and, to sustain an intended motion for a preliminary injunction against him, the plaintiffs took the testimony of the defendant and other witnesses. From the defendant's plain admissions, in his own testimony, it clearly appeared that the plaintiffs were entitled to a preliminary injunction against him, and he never made any resistance to the granting thereof. In the course of his said exami nation the defendant was interrogated, and testified as to the ownership of cer- tain oil wells he was engaged in operating. His testimony touching the ownership of the wells waa alleged to be false, and he was in- dicted for perjury. Hdd, that the defendant's alleged false state- ments in respect to the ownership of the wells did not tend to pre- vent the granting of a preliminary injunction, or defeat the due ad- ministration of justice, and were immaterial. �Indictment for Perjury. �The defendant was indicted for alleged perjury în his exam- ination before a United States commissioner, taken to be read at the hearing of a motion for a preliminary injunction against him as defendant in an equity suit in the United States circuit �T.4,no.l0— 57 ����
