IMPROVEMENT IN CRIMINAL PLEADING. lOI proof of one would suffice. Many of these recitals are in use to-day. It is not worth while to enumerate further instances of expanded descriptions of property. The foregoing is sufficient to show that a change in the direction of brevity should be made. As for the description of the offence, the reader will call to mind the long pre- cedents of indictments for manslaughter by negligence, perjury, obtaining property by false pretences, and other offences. Counts in indictments are multiplied. It is not necessary to use many pages of words in such cases.^ No useful purpose is served thereby. Many unnecessary questions are invited at the trial which would not arise if the forms were shorter. In most statutory offences the indictment is reasonably plain. The. general rule is that it is sufficient to charge the offence in the words of the statute. But there are perplexing exceptions. ^ Undoubtedly, the merciful inclination of the judges in favor of life accounts for a large part of the purely technical requirements in the old indictments. The technical rules served a justifiable and even necessary purpose in restraining the brutal severity of the criminal law a century ago. The criminal law of to-day is not brutal or unduly severe. Therefore the reason for the rules has ceased to exist. Many feel that, in the anxiety for the protection dollars," (the allegation repeated for the several denominations, — two, five, ten, etc.,) " a more particular description of which is to said (grand) jurors unknown, silver coins of the coinage of the United States, each coin of the amount and value of cents," and so on, repeating the allegation so as to include the various denominations. A statute containing a provision that it shall be sufficient to allege generally money to a certain amount, similar to the one relating to embezzlement (Pub. Sts. c. 203, § 44), would suffice to correct this practice. 1 An approved precedent of an indictment for manslaughter by negligence occupies nearly five pages, large octavo. Train & Heard, Prec. Indict. 263. A precedent in Heard's Criminal Law, p. 521, contains seven counts, var)'ing in length from a page and a half to two pages and a half. These forms were taken from Cox's Criminal Cases, and were framed before 1851. They are followed to-day in this State. The Maverick Bank prosecutions in the United States courts (Mass.), 1892-93, furnish examples of multiplication of counts. Nine indictments, containing one hun- dred and eighty-one counts, were found in the District Court against Asa P. Potter. One count was nol-prossed and the remaining one hundred and eighty were quashed for insufficiency. Two indictments, containing one hundred and ten counts, were found against him in the Circuit Court. Fifty-eight of these were quashed. The defendant was convicted on fifteen and acquitted on twenty-five. Judgment was entered in his favor on twelve. The convictions were set aside for errors which occurred at the trial. It should be said that some of the counts set forth different offences. 2 Com. V. Doherty, 103 Mass. 433; Com. v. Barrett, 108 Mass. 302; Com. v. Con- nelly, 163 Mass. 539.
