People v. Bycel, Cr. 5351
| Decision Date | 14 June 1955 |
| Docket Number | Cr. 5351 |
| Citation | 284 P.2d 927,133 Cal.App.2d 596 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Harry BYCEL, Defendant and Appellant. |
Morris Lavine, Los Angeles, for appellant.
Edmund G. Brown, Atty. Gen., James C. Maupin, Deputy Atty. Gen., for respondent.
In an information filed by the District Attorney of Los Angeles County, defendant was charged with three separate violations of buying or receiving stolen property, a felony. Penal Code Section 496.
In Count I, defendant was charged with having bought and received a stolen adding machine on or about September 3, 1952. Count II charged the felonious purchase and receipt of a calculator on or about August 28, 1952, which machine had been stolen. The third count alleged that on or about June 5, 1952, defendant bought and received two adding machines knowing them to have been stolen.
Defendant moved to dismiss the information under section 995 of the Penal Code. His motion was granted as to Count II and denied as to Counts I and III. Following entry of not guilty pleas as to the last-named counts, the cause proceeded to trial before a jury which returned verdicts of guilty under both counts of the information. Defendant's motion for a new trial was granted as to Count III and denied as to Count I. Proceedings were suspended and defendant granted conditional probation on Count I. Count II was dismissed.
From the judgment of conviction (see Penal Code Section 1237, subd. 1) and from the order denying his motion for a new trial, defendant prosecutes this appeal.
We regard the following as a fair epitome of the factual background surrounding this prosecution. On the second or third day of September, 1952, one Charles Linson burglarized the premises of the Trojan Bookkeeping Service in the City of Los Angeles, removing therefrom two adding machines, a calculator, and a typewriter, which he placed in his automobile and departed. Two or three days later, Linson went to Fifty-fifth and Long Beach Boulevard to consult with the defendant, at the One Spot liquor store. Linson told defendant that he wanted to make a deal concerning the machines. He told the defendant he wanted to 'deal' the machines off. The defendant asked what kind they were, and Linson told him. The former then asked where the machines were and Linson told him they were in a car, and the defendant looked in the car and saw them. The two men then came back to the store and the defendant made a telephone call. He then had Linson write on a piece of paper, 'Globe Bottling Company' and the name 'Cal'.
Linson wanted $50 for each of the machines but defendant refused to give more than $25. At that time Linson received no money. The defendant then gave Linson an address, a bottle cap, and told him to go to a certain place, the Globe Bottling Company on Mission Road in Los Angeles. When Linson went there, he saw a man named Cal and left one adding machine with him. Cal did not give Linson anything. After leaving the adding machine with Cal, Linson went back to Fifty-fifth and Long Beach Boulevard where he saw the defendant. Linson told the latter he had made the trip, and the defendant called back, and 'there was only one machine', whereupon defendant gave Linson $25.
Linson was prosecuted and convicted for the theft involved herein, and served time in the County Jail.
In the early part of September, 1952, Calvin A. Rowlette was called on the telephone by the defendant. The latter said he had an adding machine, and asked if Mr. Rowlette needed one. Mr. Rowlette said that he did and the defendant said, 'I'll send it up by a man.' The defendant said the price would be $50. Mr. Rowlette saw Linson at the Globe Bottling Company with the adding machine on the same afternoon that the telephone call was made.
After Linson was released from jail he went to the defendant's place of business and had a conversation. Linson told the defendant he had been 'busted'. 'Bust' in this sense means to arrest. He further told the defendant he had sent word to him, trying to make a deal, and to try to get some money from him. The defendant told Linson he wasn't doing 'too good himself, and that was about it.'
After the machines had been found, the defendant came to Linson and asked him not to testify against him, and that he, the defendant, would make everything all right with him. That conversation took place in February or March of 1954, first at the defendant's store at Fifty-fifth and Long Beach Boulevard, and on the same day in Mr. Walter Gordon's office. The defendant drove Linson to Mr. Gordon's office, and when they arrived there, the defendant told Linson that the machines had been recovered and he said, 'I want you to testify that you never sold me anything.' Linson then signed a paper that he did not sell anything to the defendant. It was signed with the name, 'John W. Lewis', which Linson was using. When the defendant returned to his store on the same day, he gave Linson twenty dollars and a pint of whiskey.
Linson talked to the defendant in court at the trial of this case and the latter said, 'You heard about some guy that got a knife stuck in him, the same thing can happen to you.'
Sworn as a witness on behalf of the defendant, St. Elmo P. Henderson testified that he had been employed by defendant and that 'around about September, 1952' between 9 and 10 in the morning, he saw a Mr. Kanner, connected with the Globe Bottling Company, in the defendant's store and that the latter was talking with Mr. Kanner when Linson entered, that defendant went over to Linson and the witness heard the latter say 'something' about an adding machine, but that defendant stated 'he wasn't interested and just turned around and walked away from him'. That Mr. Kanner then inquired of Linson as to whether the machine was 'hot' and received a...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
People v. Hartridge, Cr. 2584
...Russell's testimony, if believed by the trier of fact, is legally sufficient to qualify as corroborating testimony. See People v. Bycel, 133 Cal.App.2d 596, 284 P.2d 927; People v. Lima, supra; People v. McKinney, 71 Cal.App.2d 5, 161 P.2d 957; In re Morton 179 Cal. 510, 177 P. Appellant ch......
-
People v. Bugg
...Lodge, 190 Cal.App.2d 865, 871, 872, 12 Cal.Rptr. 352.) Guilty knowledge 'may be circumstantial and deductive.' (People v. Bycel, 133 Cal.App.2d 596, 599, 284 P.2d 927, 930; People v. Hartridge, 134 Cal.App.2d 659, 665, 286 P.2d 72.) Such knowledge may be 'inferred circumstantially.' (Peopl......
-
People v. Boinus
...was stolen. People v. De Vaughn, 136 Cal.App. 746, 751, 29 P.2d 914. Knowledge may be circumstantial and deductive. People v. Bycel, 133 Cal.App.2d 596, 599, 284 P.2d 927; People v. Hartridge, 134 Cal.App.2d 659, 665, 286 P.2d 72. Among the elements from which knowledge may be inferred are ......
-
People v. Salazar
...410.) '[I]t is not essential that such knowledge be actual and positive; it may be circumstantial and deductive.' (People v. Bycel, 133 Cal.App.2d 596, 599, 284 P.2d 927, 930.) With respect to the grinder and the electric drill (Counts I and II), the People, in their effort to establish tha......