280 N.W. 1 | Minn. | 1938
The assignments of error are confined to a challenge of the jurisdiction of the court, in that the proceeding was not tried in the proper county. This was raised by objection to the reception of any evidence, by motion to dismiss at the close of the testimony, and by requests to charge. There is no claim that the verdict finding defendant the father of the child is not sufficiently supported by the evidence.
Defendant concedes that in this state the law is settled that a filiation proceeding is, in substance, a civil action or proceeding governed in the main by the rules of practice in civil cases. 1 Dunnell, Minn. Dig. (2 ed.) § 827; State v. Jeffrey,
We also think the record shows conclusively that the district court of Becker county had jurisdiction over both defendant and the subject matter. Defendant was bound over to that court and the complaint filed therein. For failure to secure a change of venue before trial, defendant's objection to the introduction of any evidence on the ground of lack of jurisdiction of the court was properly overruled. In In re Bolman,
The other assignments of error rest upon the refusal of the court to instruct the jury that it was incumbent on the state to show by a fair preponderance of the evidence that the child involved was likely to become a charge upon the county of Becker, and that if the state had failed so to show by a fair preponderance of the evidence the verdict should be not guilty. In that connection error is also predicated upon the refusal to give requested instruction regarding the settlement of the mother under the poor relief statute. We do not think the court erred in refusing to give either request. There was no dispute as to the fact that the child was begotten and born in Montana; that its mother, the complainant, was born and raised in Becker county, that she was on a visit there when the complaint was filed in the municipal court of Detroit Lakes, said county, and that previous thereto she had brought the child to that county and arranged with a person there to keep and care for the child for a consideration, and that ever since such arrangement the child had remained in said county up to the trial. The fact that complainant, after filing the complaint, went or returned to St. Paul, where she worked, is of no importance, and has no bearing upon the issue of whether or not defendant is the father of the child. A child left in Becker county under the situation here presented is, as a matter of law, likely to become a charge upon the county. If anything happened to its mother so that the payments she has agreed to make for its care and keeping are not made, the county where the child is found is almost certain to be charged with its keep. But, aside from that, the mother could file the complaint in any justice or municipal court in the state, and the district court of the county to which such justice or municipal court bound defendant over had jurisdiction to determine defendant's *105 paternity, unless defendant timely secured a change of venue. We think the trial court properly refused to give the requested instruction concerning settlement under the poor relief statutes.
The order is affirmed.