People v. Cohen
| Decision Date | 07 November 1951 |
| Docket Number | Cr. 4682 |
| Citation | 107 Cal.App.2d 334,237 P.2d 301 |
| Parties | PEOPLE v. COHEN et al. |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
Murray M. Chotiner, Beverly Hills, for appellant.
Edmund G. Brown, Atty. Gen., Elizabeth Miller, Deputy Atty. Gen., for respondent.
Appellant was convicted of feloniously engaging in bookmaking upon the result of a trial and contest of speed and power of endurance between horses, a crime denounced by section 337a subdivision 1, of the Penal Code. 1 He demands a reversal upon the asserted insufficiency of the evidence and errors of law occurring at the trial. He was accused jointly with three others with whose fortunes the result of this appeal is not concerned.
About seven o'clock on the morning of October 12, 1950, police officers Duncan and Brooks stationed themselves in a position to observe the premises numbered 1003 on a popular boulevard of Los Angeles. Half an hour later defendant Rose unlocked the front door of those premises, entered and sat at a desk for 10 minutes. On emerging from 1003 he was placed under arrest. In his shirt pocket were found four slips of paper, received in evidence as exhibit 1. The officer took from Rose a key with which he entered the building. He found in the desk drawer one envelope marked 'Cecil' containing eleven slips of paper (exhibit 2), three envelopes (exhibits 3a, 3b and 3c) each marked 'King,' each holding slips of paper. Leaving all envelopes where they were, Duncan removed Rose to officer Brooks on a neighboring street and returned to the boulevard where he observed defendants Frink and Richards enter 1003. He entered to find Richards holding the 'King' envelopes. He searched Mrs. Frink from whom he took a key and a check (exhibit 4). Having removed Frink and Richards to Brooks and the police car, Duncan resumed his watch over the premises and was soon rewarded by the approach of a black sedan moving southward on the boulevard. As it passed the premises under surveilance it slowed down perceptibly as its two occupants both looked toward 1003. They proceeded two blocks, made a U-turn, again passed 1003, retarded their speed, continued looking at the premises, turned at the next corner and repeated the circuit. Officer Brooks rejoined his companion and the two officers together stopped the sedan in which appellant and a companion were passengers and placed them under arrest. Brooks promptly took a yellow sheet from appellant's hands and several pieces of paper from his pockets. The yellow sheet was subsequently marked exhibit 6.
One of the slips (exhibit 1) taken from Rose was an 'owe sheet.' It contained the names of betters and the amounts of the debt of each to agent Cecil and the sums owed by him to the listed betters. One of the betting markers showed the wagers recorded, the amounts won and lost, and that 'Leroy' owed agent Cecil $12.75. The second betting marker showed bets that had been placed on certain horses designated by numbers. The amount wagered on that marker was $198 and the amount won by the listed horses was $401.15. The subtraction of the wagers from the winnings gave $203.15 owed to cash by Cecil. The third marker contained similar notations. All bore date October 11, 1950. 2 By 'spot checking' the markers and the owe sheet with California Digest of October 11, 1950, it was revealed by aid of the testimony of the expert witness that the horses listed in the markers had run on that day. Each was stamp-dated 'October 11'; some bore the number of the horses that ran on that day. Some showed the amount of each wager and the totals of the winnings and losses and the net sum due by the agent to his principal.
The top sheet in exhibit 3a was a recapitulation written on adding-machine tape whose figures corresponded with those on one card written with pencil by appellant. Also included in the same packet were many yellow sheets. Each was a professional type betting marker. Each bore the name of a better and the initial of the agent; each contained the number of the horse; the sum wagered to win or to place, the amount won and the loss to be collected from or to be paid to the agent whose initial is on the marker.
Another envelope taken from the desk contained many professional type markers dated '10-10' and a top sheet. Below the double line of the top sheet were memoranda in the hand writing of appellant. Another envelope contained betting markers dated October 9 showing the wagers, betters and agent and a top sheet with a list of bets, betters, losses and winnings of each and the initial of the agent. The writing on the latter sheet below the top double line was that of appellant. A spot comparison of the documents in exhibits 3a and 3b with the California Digest disclosed that the horses whose numbers were on the betting markers ran on October 10 and 11, 1950. And the sport section of a metropolitan daily published in Los Angeles established that the horses identified by the California Digest had paid through the parimutuel machines at the tracks indicated by the Digest the identical winnings shown on the markers of those dates.
The yellow sheet with pencil markings was taken by officer Brooks from appellant at the time of his arrest. It was accompanied by two tapes from an adding machine and two other yellow sheets and a white sheet with writing. At the trial they were marked exhibit 7. Also taken from appellant was an exemplar of his own handwriting, at the trial marked exhibit 10. The first white tape in exhibit 7 carried the name 'Cecil, October 11' and printed numbers whose aggregate sum, $114.90, followed. Other printed numbers were followed by their aggregate amount, 22760, under which was written in pencil 11490, and beneath it appears in writing P11270, the difference of the two former numbers. The figures preceded by 'C' on the bottoms of the betting markers in exhibits 1 and 2 are the identical figures found in the first group on tape number 1 in exhibit 7 while the figures preceded by 'P' on the bottom of the betting markers in exhibits 1 and 2 are the same as the second group of figures added on tape number 1 of exhibit 7.
Tape number 2 in exhibit 7 contains printed figures with names written to the left of them. Each name or initial on tape number 2 and its figures are found on exhibit 6. The yellow sheet No. 1 in exhibit 7 has names with figures opposite. Some of the same names are found in exhibit 6 but the figures opposite them are different. Yellow sheet No. 2 in exhibit 7 was patterned after yellow sheet No. 1 although its names and figures were different from those in sheet No. 1. The testimony of the witness Sloan established that the pencil writing on the two yellow sheets is that of appellant.
Also in exhibit 7 is a large white sheet bearing a list of names with figures opposite them including the name 'King.' By a comparison of these names and figures it is found that they appear in the same relation to each other on exhibit 6 and the writing on the white sheet is that of appellant.
It is thus established that appellant was engaged in bookmaking, denounced by section 337a, Penal Code. If he was not a bookmaker, why was the list of betters and winners written by his hand in the books taken from the possession of bookmakers? If he was not a bookmaker, why was he searching for someone before 10 o'clock in the morning at 1003, a rendezvous for bookmakers? Inside those premises two bookmakers were arrested. In their possession were betting markers and owe sheets and the writing of appellant. If he had been innocently requested by another person in Nevada to deliver the lists to 1003 as he testified, he would have stopped in front of that location and delivered the package instead of driving twice around the block watching eagerly for a friend to emerge from the building.
His possession of $4,900 at the time of his arrest is a potent link in the chain of circumstances to prove his vocation. A person of ordinarily honest habits in importing so large a sum from Nevada to California would have made use of bank exchange. While the denials and explanations given by appellant from the witness stand might have warranted acquittal of the charge, the trial judge did not choose to believe him but proceeded to rely upon the inferences reasonably drawn from the circumstances established and from his testimony that within the two preceding days he had by gambling in Nevada increased $500 to about $4,000; his method of transporting such moneys to California; that he had written in Las Vegas the list of figures on exhibits 7, 3a, 3b and 3c at the dictation of his friend Fisher with whom he traveled to Los Angeles; his manner of approaching 1003; the possession by his codefendants of betting markers written by his hand; facts that the groups of papers, the betting markers and owe sheet taken from appellant corresponded with the names, initials and figures on the owe sheets and markers taken from the desk at 1003, and from the possession of the other defendants and that the owe sheets taken from Rose and the tapes taken from appellant both had the handwriting of appellant. These facts together with the conduct of appellant on the witness stand warrant the inference that on October 12, 1950 a book of bets was made or being made and that appellant was a participant in the inglorious enterprise.
The handwriting on the owe sheets attached to exhibits 3a, 3b, 3c, 7 and 10 is all or in part that of appellant. At the time of his arrest he had a tape with figures stamped on it. They are the same figures as those preceded by C or P on the markers taken from Rose. Some of these papers were written by appellant. The name Cecil and King and the letter K were found on some of the papers in appellant's possession.
The judgment of the trial court will not be reversed by a...
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