Connor v. State

Decision Date02 May 1892
Citation10 So. 891,29 Fla. 455
PartiesCONNOR v. STATE.
CourtFlorida Supreme Court

Error to criminal court of record, Marion county; W. S. BULLOCK Judge.

Information against Claude E. Connor for obtaining property under false pretenses. Defendant's motion to quash the information was overruled, and he brings error. Reversed, with directions to quash the information.

Syllabus by the Court

SYLLABUS

1. The receipt or obtaining of property obtained under false pretenses is the consummation of the offense; and when the pretenses are made in one jurisdiction, and the property is obtained by the offender in another jurisdiction, the prosecution can be instituted only in the latter jurisdiction, unless there is a valid statute permitting it elsewhere.

2. An allegation that the party defrauded 'then and there, by reason of said false pretenses' (they having been previously set forth in the information) 'of the said defendants, and fully relying upon and believing in the truth thereof, were then and there induced to part with their ownership of and in said thirty-two hundred dollars to the said' defendants, 'and did then and there part with their ownership in said thirty-two hundred dollars to said defendants,' is not tantamount to an allegation that the defendants obtained the money.

3. An allegation that the defendants 'obtained' by false pretenses, previously described, certain money, but not indicating where they obtained it, and one that the party defrauded, then and there relying upon the pretenses, and believing in their truth, were then and there induced to part with their ownership of and in the money, and did then and there part with their ownership in the same to the defendants, do not show where the money was obtained by defendants, or that it was obtained in the county or jurisdiction where the pretenses were, as previously alleged made.

4. An information charging the crime of obtaining property under false pretenses is uncertain as to the venue or jurisdictional locality of the offense where, having previously named two or more places, it simply uses the word 'there' (in the expression 'then and there') in charging the obtaining of the property; and it is consequently insufficient, and should be quashed.

5. An information for obtaining property under false pretenses which, by reason of its uncertainty, does not make it appear that the property was obtained in the county where the pretenses were made, nor elsewhere in the state of Florida does not show that a court of the county where the pretenses are alleged to have been made has jurisdiction of the offense; and this even under a statute (section 4, p. 446, McClel. Dig.) which provides that in all cases where an indictable offense shall be perpetrated in Florida, and the same shall commence in one county and terminate in another, the person offending shall be liable to indictment in either county.

COUNSEL R. L. Anderson and R. W. Davis, for plaintiff in error.

W. B. Lamar, Atty. Gen., for the State.

OPINION

RANEY C.J.

The information is for obtaining property under false pretenses. There was a motion made in the trial court to quash the information, but the motion was overruled, and error has been assigned on this action. The first ground of the motion to be noticed is the one asserting that the information does not show jurisdiction of the court to try the cause. The principle of law relied upon in support of this contention is that the receipt of money or other property obtained under false pretenses is the consummation of the offense, and the place of its receipt by the offender is the locality of jurisdiction. The receipt or obtaining of the property is the consummation of the offense, and in the absence of a valid qualifying statute the place of its receipt is the sole locality of jurisdiction. If the false pretenses are made in one jurisdiction, but the property is obtained in another, the prosecution must, in the absence of such a statute, be instituted in the latter jurisdiction. 7 Amer. & Eng. Enc. Law, 758, 762. In State v. House, 55 Iowa, 466, 8 N.W. 307, where the property alleged to have been fraudulently obtained consisted of promissory notes and a mortgage securing the notes, the false pretenses were made, and an agreement of settlement providing for the execution and delivery of the notes and mortgage was executed in Wright county, and afterwards the notes and mortgage were made and delivered to the defendant in Polk county, where he was indicted, tried, and convicted, and it was held that the false pretenses made in Wright county were not a crime; that an indictment would not lie there, because the notes were not obtained there; and that as the crime was consummated in Polk county, by the delivery of the papers in that county, the indictment was properly found there, no matter where the false representations which induced their delivery were made. In Skiff v. People, 2 Parker, Crim. R. 139, the county of the delivery of the property was held to be the proper county for the trial of the offense, though the note for the property was not made and delivered until subsequently, and in another county. Norris v. State, 25 Ohio St. 217, decides that where one, by false pretenses contained in a letter sent by mail, procures the owner of goods to deliver them to a designated common carrier in one county, consigned to the writer in another county, the offense of obtaining goods by false pretenses is complete in the former county, and the offense must be prosecuted therein; the delivery of the goods to the common carrier being a delivery to the defendant's agent, and hence in law a delivery to the defendant. In People v. Adams, 3 Denio, 190, Adams and another were indicted in the city of New York for obtaining money from a firm of commission merchants in that city by exhibiting to them fictitious receipts signed by the other defendant in Ohio, falsely acknowledging the delivery to such other defendant of a quantity of produce for the use of, and subject to the order of, the firm; and Adams pleaded that he was a natural-born citizen of Ohio, and had always resided there, and had never been in the state of New York; that the receipts were drawn and signed in Ohio; and that the offense was committed by the receipts being presented in New York to the firm by innocent agents there, employed by the defendant in Ohio,--and the plea was adjudged to be bad, and the indictment to have been properly found in New York. And, in entire consistency with this decision, it was held in Stewart v. Jessup, 51 Ind. 413, that a person is not liable to conviction and punishment in Indiana for obtaining property under false pretenses, where the property has been obtained outside of that state, although the false pretenses may have been made within it. See, also, In re Carr, 28 Kan. 1; State v. Round, 82 Mo. 679; State v. Shaeffer, 89 Mo. 271, 1 S.W. 293; Com. v. Taylor, 105 Mass. 172; Com. v. Wood, 142 Mass. 459, 8 N.E. 432; Com. v. Van Tuyl, 1 Metc. (Ky.) 1.

We will defer any consideration of the statutory provision that in all cases where an indictable offense shall be perpetrated in this state, and the same shall commence in any one county and terminate in another, the person offending shall be liable to indictment in either county, (section 4, p. 446, McClel. Dig.,) and will test the information, upon the point of venue, by the rules of law laid down above.

The allegations of the first count, as to obtaining the money are, substituting figures for words, as follows: 'And the said Connor, Chambliss, and Vogt, by means of the said false pretenses, obtained from the said bank, and the said Rollins, Morgan, and Greeley, as its managing agents and directors, certain moneys, to wit, $3,200, of the value of $3,200, the property of said bank. And the said bank, and the said Rollins, Morgan, and Greeley, as its directors and managing agents, then and there, by reason of the said false pretenses of the said defendants, and fully relying upon and believing in the truth thereof, were then and there induced to part with their ownership of and in the said $3,200 to the said Connor, Chambliss, and Vogt, and did then and there part with their ownership in said $3,200 to said defendants.' It is apparent that there is nothing said in the first of the above-quoted sentences as to place, and hence no express statement as to where the defendants obtained the money. Assuming, as we will, for the purpose of the point under discussion, that the venue of the pretenses, as previously laid in the count, is in Marion county, still such distinctive allegation of venue cannot be invoked to show that the defendants did obtain the money in the same locality or jurisdiction, in the absence of apt words connecting the obtaining of the money with it. The first sentence, then, fails altogether to show where the money was obtained, or where, in the light of the above authorities, the offense was consummated or is indictable; and consequently the count must be held to be insufficient unless we can find from...

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