People v. Carzoli

• Decision Date: 25 October 1930
• Docket Number: No. 20044.,20044.
• Citation: People v. Carzoli , 340 Ill. 587, 173 N.E. 141 (Ill. 1930)
• Parties: PEOPLE v. CARZOLI et al.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

340 Ill. 587

173 N.E. 141

PEOPLE

v.CARZOLI et al.

No. 20044.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Oct. 25, 1930.

Error to Criminal Court, Cook County; Frank Comerford, Judge.

Rex Carzoli and Albert Walz were convicted of kidnapping for ransom, and they bring error.

Reversed and remanded.John F. Cashen, Jr., of Chicago, for plaintiffs in error.

Oscar E. Carlstrom, Atty. Gen., John A. Swanson, State's Atty., of Chicago, and James B. Searcy, of Springfield (Edward E. Wilson and John Holman, both of Chicago, of counsel), for the People.

DE YOUNG, J.

An indictment was returned in the criminal court of Cook county against Rex Carzoli and Albert Walz.The indictment consisted of twenty-seven counts, three of which charged kidnapping, sixteen kidnapping for ransom, six extortion by threats, and two extortion.The defendants' pleas were not guilty, but when the prosecution's evidence had been introduced, they changed their pleas to guilty.The jury was thereupon withdrawn and the court sentenced each of the defendants to the penitentiary for life.By this writ of error they seek a review of the proceedings which resulted in their conviction.

Five errors are assigned and argued by the plaintiffs in error, but it will be necessary to consider only the contention that the trial court erred in denying their motion to vacate the judgment and to allow them to withdraw their pleas of guilty.

The evidence on behalf of the prosecution is, in substance, as follows: Joseph Wadycki, seventeen years of age, was about to enter his home at noon on September 15, 1928, when he was stopped by Rex Carzoli, who accused him of stealing alcohol from a garage where Wadycki had been employed.Wadycki accompanied Carzoli to the garage and they waited in the office until a man named Chess Chess and Carzoli forced Wadycki into an automobile and they drove to a certain hotel, entered through a side or alley entrance, and went to a room on the main floor.Later in the day Albert Walz and Max Downey arrived.Downey identified Wadycki as one of the boys who, with himself, had stolen alcohol from the garage.Wadycki, upon denying the charge, was beaten, struck with the end of a revolver, and rolled on the floor.Chess and Carzoli left the room for a short time.Wadycki asked Downey what alcohol was the subject of inquiry and Downey advised him to admit the theft.Chess and Carzolireturned to the room and began beating Wadycki again.They pointed a revolver at him and threatened to take his life if he did not disclose where the stolen alcohol was kept.Wadycki then admitted the theft, and one of the men told him he would have to pay for the alcohol.He answered that he had no money since he was not employed, but that he would try to borrow it from his father.About midnight Walz took Wadycki home, and when the latter's father opened the door Walz requested the son to tell his father what he had admitted at the hotel.Wadycki told his father that he and another person had stolen some alcohol; that he owed $50 for it; and that, if his father would lend him the money, he would work to repay it.The father answered that he did not have the money.Walz replied that he would kill the boy if the sum specified were not forthcoming.The father then asked that his son be left at home and that Walz return the next day to ascertain what he(the father) could do.Walz returned as requested, and the father then told him that he would receive his wages three days later and that he would pay him on that day between 5:30 and 6 o'clock.About the appointed time Carzoli and another person appeared and the father paid $50 to the third person and took his receipt for the money.

Nearly six months later, about February 22, 1929, Carzoli again called at the home of the elder Wadycki and informed him that his son had been accused of stealing alcohol a second time and that it would require $100 to settle the matter.Wadycki asked when his son took the alcohol, and Carzoli answered about two or three weeks previously.Wadycki replied that it was impossible his son could be guilty of the theft, because at that time he was employed at night.Carzoli asserted that he had a witness who saw Wadycki's son take the alcohol.Wadycki requested Carzoli to return the next day.The police department was notified; at the appointed time Carzoli appeared and renewed him demand upon Wadycki for $100, and two police officers, who had hidden in the house, came forward and arrested Carzoli.He was taken to a police station and signed a statement admitting that the charge against Joseph Wadycki was only a pretense to obtain money.Carzoli implicated Walz in the crime and the latter was arrested in a rooming house the next day.Walz also signed a statement.Carzoli was nineteen and Walz was twenty-four years of age, and neither had ever before been charged with a criminal offense.

Upon the question whether the statements had been voluntarily made, Carzoli testified that the police officers beat and kicked him and struck him with a revolver and a black-jack.Walz testified that he was threatened by the officers, and that one of them used a black-jack to strike him on the neck and back.Each testified that if he denied doing what a question propounded by one of the police officers implied, the officer would ask Joseph Wadycki whether it had been done, and if he answered in the affirmative, the stenographer was directed to write the answer as that of the plaintiff in error interrogated.The officers accused denied that they had used force to obtain the statements.

The admission of the statements concluded the introduction of the prosecution's evidence, and counsel for the plaintiffs in error thereupon stated that his clients desired to withdraw their pleas of not guilty and to plead guilty.The trial judge remarked that the pleas of guilty, if made, would have to be entered to the whole indictment; that the plaintiffs in error must decide the question at once, because otherwise he would be required to postpone the trial to attend a meeting of judges in another part of the city, in which event he would return to dispose of the case that day even if it required a session during the afternoon and evening.The judge further remarked that kidnapping was punishable by death.Carzoli answered that the offense proved was not kidnapping for ransom.The judge replied that he had heard the evidence; that it was a capital case; and that, if the jury returned a verdict fixing the punishment at death, he would not disturb it.Walz then stated that he was not implicated in any kidnapping charge but only in the offense of extortion.Answering him, the judge said: ‘The testimony is that you went to the place of kidnaping at the Rosette Hotel at about 2:30 in the afternoon of the day that the complaining witness here, Joseph Wadycki, was taken in a Chrysler sedan at 12:30.’Walz started to say, ‘I didn't go,’ but was interrupted by the judge's statement that if he pleaded guilty he must do it as his voluntary act with the understanding that no promise had been made to him and with the warning that the punishment prescribed by the statute might be imposed.Walz iterated that he was not guilty of kidnaping, but that he would plead guilty to the charge of extortion.The judge replied that only the plea of guilty to the indictment would be entertained.Walz reiterated that he had no part in any kidnaping; that his plea to that charge was not guilty, but that to the charge of extortion he would plead guilty.The judge then told Walz that his case would stand on the plea of not guilty.To the judge's inquiry whether he wanted to enter a plea of guilty, Carzoli answered that he did.Walz then said that if Carzoli entered such a plea, he too would do so.To the judge's further inquiry whether any promise had...