AD TUNC ET IBIDEM

Definition

Ad tunc et ibidem is a Latin phrase meaning "then and there." In criminal pleading, it is the technical name for the clause in an indictment that connects a material fact to the time and place already established earlier in the charging instrument — literally, the allegation that the person, object, or circumstance was "then and there being found." The phrase functions as a shorthand device in formal pleading. Once a date, year, and place have been stated with particularity in an indictment, subsequent averments of each distinct material fact must repeat the temporal and locational allegation. Rather than restating the full date and venue each time, pleaders would employ ad tunc et ibidem — "then and there" — to incorporate the previously specified time and place by reference.

Why It Matters in Research

Researchers encountering historical indictments — particularly those from English common law practice and early American criminal proceedings — will find this phrase appearing repeatedly in charging documents as a formulaic connector. Its presence signals that the drafter is tying an additional material fact back to the time and place established in the venue clause or an earlier averment, not introducing a new time or location. The practical trap: ad tunc et ibidem is not mere stylistic filler. At common law, the requirement to allege time and place for every distinct material fact was a substantive pleading rule, not a technicality. A defective or omitted ad tunc et ibidem clause could expose an indictment to challenge on a motion to quash or in arrest of judgment. Researchers reviewing historical indictments should understand that the phrase carried real procedural weight — its absence or misplacement was not harmless. This term appears almost exclusively in historical sources. Modern criminal pleading rules — especially following the adoption of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and analogous state reforms — abandoned the hyper-technical common law indictment form. Contemporary charging instruments do not use this phrase or the pleading conventions it served. Researchers working in post-reform materials will not encounter it in live practice. Corpus connections: This term belongs to the cluster of Latin pleading formulae that saturate pre-twentieth-century criminal records, treatises on common law pleading, and abridgements such as Bacon's Abridgement. Researchers consulting those sources should be familiar with the full vocabulary of formal indictment structure — venue clause, traversal, material averment — to situate ad tunc et ibidem correctly.

Historical Dictionary Support

Black's Law Dictionary (both the first and second editions) defines the term identically and concisely: the Latin name for the clause of an indictment containing the statement of the subject-matter "then and there being found." No elaboration is offered in either edition beyond this identification of function. Bouvier's Law Dictionary provides the most substantive treatment. Bouvier confirms the same core function but adds the critical procedural rule: in an indictment, the allegation of time and place must be repeated in the averment of every distinct material fact. After the day, year, and place have been stated once with certainty, ad tunc et ibidem serves as the repeating mechanism. Bouvier's citation to Bacon's Abridgement (Indictment, G. 4) and to early North Carolina Reports (1 No. C. 93) grounds the usage in accessible primary authorities. One entry in the Bouvier source material appears to be a database artifact — a passage concerning dower and real property that has no connection to this term. Researchers should disregard it; it does not reflect Bouvier's treatment of ad tunc et ibidem. All three historical dictionaries agree on the meaning. None provides significant divergence. What the historical sources collectively omit is any discussion of the consequences of a defective clause or the pleading reform trajectory that rendered the phrase obsolete — gaps a researcher should supply from treatise literature on common law criminal pleading.

Jurisdictional Note

Ad tunc et ibidem is a creature of English common law pleading practice and carried into early American criminal procedure. Its force was universal across common law jurisdictions during the period of formal indictment pleading. By the mid-twentieth century, procedural reform had eliminated the technical necessity of the phrase in virtually all American jurisdictions.

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