Cooper v. United States

• Decision Date: 06 December 1926
• Docket Number: No. 4475.,4475.
• Citation: 16 F.2d 830
• Parties: COOPER et al. v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

16 F.2d 830 (1926)

COOPER et al. v. UNITED STATES.

No. 4475.

Court of Appeals of District of Columbia.

Submitted November 2, 1926.

Decided December 6, 1926.

T. M. Wampler, of Washington, D. C., for appellants.

Peyton Gordon and W. H. Collins, both of Washington, D. C., for the United States.

Before MARTIN, Chief Justice, ROBB, Associate Justice, and BARBER, Judge of the United States Court of Customs Appeals.

BARBER, Acting Associate Justice.

The appellants, defendants below, were convicted and sentenced in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia upon an indictment charging the crime of larceny; the property alleged to have been stolen being described in the indictment as "three certain articles of wearing apparel for women, commonly known as and called dresses, each of the value of thirty-five dollars, nine handkerchiefs, each of the value of one dollar, and five other handkerchiefs, each of the value of one dollar and twenty-five cents, of the goods, chattels, and property of one Elsbeth Gillespie."

At the time defendants were first taken into custody, the arresting officer had no warrant against them. They had then in their possession a suit case or bag, which the officer opened and searched, and from which he removed certain articles of personal property. Thereafter officers entered the defendants' home and took therefrom certain other clothing and personal effects.

Prior to the trial below, the defendants filed a petition with the court, praying that all the property be returned to them, alleging, as to that taken from the suit case, that they were not then under arrest or charged with crime, and, as to that taken from their home, that the officers searched the premises without any warrant or legal authority so to do, and took therefrom "clothing and personal effects of the petitioners."

The petition and the government's answer thereto were duly heard, with the result that the property taken from the home was ordered returned; as to that taken from the suit case, the petition was overruled. Also, prior to the trial, the defendants moved that the government furnish a bill of particulars particularly specifying, describing, and identifying each piece of personal property referred to in the indictment. This motion was overruled.

The defendants contend:

1. That the court erred in denying the motion for the bill of particulars. We know of no statute or rule of practice that compels the granting of such a motion. No authority to that effect is cited. Counsel, however, argues that, because the order for the return was, in effect, a suppression of the use of the returned property as evidence against the defendants, it was vital to them in preparing their defense that they know whether any property seized in their home was included in the description of the personal property mentioned in the indictment. Inasmuch as that part of the petition for the return of the seized property which was granted alleged that such property was the clothing and personal effects of the defendants, there would seem to be no reason for them to believe that the indictment charged them with stealing that property, or that it would be offered in evidence, or, if received, that it would possess any evidentiary value against them. The fact that it was not actually returned, as argued by counsel, although the record does not affirmatively so show, or if it was not their property, does not alter the case, because the indictment sufficiently describes that which they were charged with stealing. In addition to this, there is nothing in the record that in the least tends to show that the property ordered returned was used in evidence at the trial below. The refusal to grant the motion for the bill of particulars was not error.

2. At the trial below the defendants offered no evidence. That offered by the government tended to show that the defendants were arrested by the officer as they came out of a certain cafeteria in the city. He said to them, "Girls, we want you to the station;" but whether he then used the word "arrest," or not, the evidence does not definitely show. He took defendants to the police station, where, with the permission of one of them, the suit case was opened and the property represented by Exhibits 1, 2, 3, and 4...