People v. Nathanson
| Decision Date | 15 March 1945 |
| Docket Number | No. 28063.,28063. |
| Citation | 389 Ill. 311,59 N.E.2d 677 |
| Parties | PEOPLE v. NATHANSON. |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Error to Second Division Appellate Court, First District, on Error to Criminal Court, Cook County; John A. Sbarbaro, Judge.
Frank L. Nathanson was convicted of conspiracy, and the conviction was affirmed, 321 Ill.App. 158, 52 N.E.2d 299, by the Appellate Court, to which the cause was transferred by the Supreme Court, 382 Ill. 145, 47 N.E.2d 85. To review the judgment, defendant brings error.
Affirmed.
Wm. Scott Stewart, of Chicago, for plaintiff in error.
George F. Barrett, Atty. Gen., and Thomas J. Courtney, State's Atty., of Chicago (Edward E. Wilson, John T. Gallagher, and Melvin S. Rembe, all of Chicago, of counsel), for the People.
Under an indictment charging the crime of conspiracy, the plaintiff in error was found guilty by a jury in the criminal court of Cook county and sentenced to the county jail for a term of one year and fined $2,000.
The indictment consisted of two counts. Count 1 charged that the plaintiff in error, Gladys McCall, Nancy Rosenbush and one John Doe conspired with each other and with divers other persons whose names were unknown, and by means which were unknown to the grand jurors, to cause a large number of women to abort or miscarry when said women were, respectively, pregnant with child and when such respective abortions and miscarriages were not necessary for the preservation of life.
The second count, which was dismissed, alleged a conspiracy to cause one Betty Diamond to miscarry. Gladys McCall, receptionist in plaintiff in error's office, was tried jointly with the plaintiff in error and was acquitted by a directed verdict at the conclusion of all the evidence. Nancy Rosenbush, the nurse, and a so-called interne who administered an anesthetic and who was designated in the indictment as John Doe, were not apprehended.
After the imposition of sentence in the circuit court of Cook county, the plaintiff in error, Dr. Nathanson, brought the appeal to this court, claiming he had been deprived of certain constitutional rights. The cause was transferred to the Appellate Court upon our view that no bona fide constitutional questions were involved. People v. Nathanson, 382 Ill. 145, 47 N.E.2d 85. At the hearing in the trial court, Bernice Ceropski, one of the State's witnesses, testified that she was married, knew the plaintiff in error and visited him at his office in Chicago on November 24, 1941. She had a conversation with the doctor and told him that she was pregnant, having missed two of her menstrual periods, and that she suffered from nausea. In response to the doctor's question as to why she wanted to get rid of it, the witness stated that she didn't have sufficient money to keep it up; that her husband didn't have a good job; that she worked and was just able to get along and she had to do something about it and wanted to get rid of it. The doctor asked her how much money she had, whereupon she told him $35 and gave this sum to him. Thereafter, the nurse, Nancy Rosenbush, gave her an enema and prepared her for the operating table. She was shaved by the doctor and an anesthetic administered by the interne. In the operating room was a table and a variety of surgical instruments. When the witness came out from under the anesthetic, she was given an injection in the thigh by Dr. Nathanson. After being taken to another room, the nurse gave her some pills, for which she paid an additional $2. After leaving the doctor's office, she became ill and remained so the following day, whereupon she telephoned the plaintiff in error and complained about her condition. She again returned to the doctor's office, was given another enema by plaintiff in error and again anesthetized by the interne, after which another injection was given to her in the thigh. At approximately 11 o'clock on the night before the trial, the plaintiff in error called at her home and told her that he had given a lawyer, not of record in this case, $1,500 to give to her and endeavored to persuade her not to prosecute him.
Muriel Jensen Minch testified that she was a graduate nurse and had had a conversation with Dr. Nathanson in the presence of her husband on the morning of December 3, 1941, and told him that her last menstrual period had been six weeks prior to that date. She asked him what method he employed and whether he did a complete dilatation and curettage. The plaintiff in error told her that was his manner of procedure. She was thereupon prepared and assisted to the operating table by the nurse. The plaintiff in error shaved her in the public region and the interne administered the anesthetic. When she regained consciousness, she inquired whether it was all over and was advised by the interne that nothing was done; that ‘we got a call from the front.’ He told her to dress as quickly as possible, which she did, and she was then taken upstairs to an apartment through a corridor leading from a door out of the doctor's office where she saw the defendant, a Mrs. Walke, Miss Diamond and the nurse. The plaintiff in error informed all of them that if they would be quiet and stay there for a while, when the police left they would be able to go and would not be molested. Before leaving the apartment with Mrs. Walke, she told the plaintiff in error she would telephone him if the police had left and ten minutes after leaving the office she telephoned the doctor and advised him that the police were no longer there.
Betty Jane Diamond testified she went to the doctor's office with her father on December 3, 1941, where the plaintiff in error examined her privates with his hands. After the examination, her father asked the doctor if he could take care of her and Nathanson replied he would. Her father asked the doctor how much it would cost and told the doctor he had only $65 with him. The plaintiff in error wanted $100 but agreed to take care of her. Her father then left and she was taken by the nurse and given a gown to put on after removing all of her clothes. She was then placed on the operating table, shaved and given an anesthetic. Afterwards, she was dressed and taken upstairs to the apartment. There, she saw two girls leave the apartment and heard the interne tell them to call back after they left. When she left the building, she left by a different entrance than that which she used to enter the doctor's office.
Frank Diamond, the father of Betty Jane, corroborated the daughter's testimony. He testified that the doctor asked him for $100 but that he told him he had only $60; that the doctor said under the circumstances he would take care of the daughter; that the father thereupon left the office and returned about 2 o'clock in the afternoon and found the police present.
David Lichtenstein, a police officer, testified that he and Sgt. Mulhern procured a warrant and proceeded to plaintiff in error's office about noon on December 3, 1941. They were told by the receptionist to wait a moment. After waiting an hour, they forced their way into the office but found no one present. They searched the place and found an archway leading to another building and, upon going in there, they found the plaintiff in error and Miss McCall. The police officers took both of them to the Holy Cross hospital where Mrs. Ceropski was being treated by another physician following her treatment by Dr. Nathanson. The plaintiff in error was identified by Mrs. Ceropski in the presence of the officers.
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...to complete their intended crime in no way lessens the degree of culpability involved in the criminal combination. People v. Nathanson, 389 Ill. 311, 318, 59 N.E.2d 677, 680, certiorari denied, 325 U.S. 872, 65 S.Ct. 1412, 89 L.Ed. 1990 (1945) (holding that in a prosecution for conspiracy t......
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