People v. Hurst

• Decision Date: 01 July 1886
• Citation: 28 N.W. 838,62 Mich. 276
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: PEOPLE v. HURST.

28 N.W. 838

62 Mich. 276

PEOPLE v. HURST.

Supreme Court of Michigan

July 1, 1886

Exceptions from recorder's court of Detroit.

James J. Brown and William B. Jackson, for defendant.

CAMPBELL C.J.

Respondent was convicted of embezzling $275, alleged to have been put in his hands by one Lena J. Smith as her agent. Respondent was a lawyer, and also engaged more or less in renting houses. Mrs Smith formed his acquaintance while seeking to rent a house. She got him to lend $400 for her, which he did on mortgage. She further said she had $1,100 more to lend. He said he had a place for $700, which he actually lent on first mortgage. He also showed her a letter from a man who had a parcel of 40 acres of land to sell, and he wanted her to give him the money to buy it, as he knew of a purchaser who would buy at an advance. She handed him $400 to buy the land and said he might have the profit. He told her where the land was, but she could not remember, and did not testify upon that point. This was on March 31, 1882. The embezzlement is charged as of that day. About the middle of April she saw him at his house, intoxicated. She asked him for her papers, and if he had invested the money, and he shook his head, and said he had been "on a drunk." She asked for her money and he gave her $100, and a chattel mortgage which he owned, for $25. She asked him if that was all he had, and he said it was, and promised to pay the balance in a month or two, and asked her to wait on him. She called on him frequently, and in the fall he conveyed to her 40 acres of land in Cheboygan county as security until he could pay her. He said he was selling some land for a lady in Springwells; and, if he succeeded, his commissions would exceed his debt to her, and he would pay her, and she could return the deed, which she need not record, but he would pay for recording. She agreed to wait on him, and hold the deed as security a little longer, until he could sell the 25 acres referred to. She subsequently dunned him frequently, and, finding he had an interest in a patent-right, asked him to assign that to her as security, which he did. There was some other testimony which was material, in favor of defendant, on which his counsel made some points, which we do not now think it necessary to decide.

In our opinion, the testimony did not make out a case of embezzlement. Before that offense can be made out, it must distinctly appear that the...