People v. Rappaport

• Decision Date: 16 October 1936
• Docket Number: No. 23529.,23529.
• Citation: 4 N.E.2d 106,364 Ill. 238
• Parties: PEOPLE v. RAPPAPORT.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

364 Ill. 238

4 N.E.2d 106

PEOPLE

v.RAPPAPORT.

No. 23529.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

June 17, 1936.

Rehearing Denied Oct. 16, 1936.

Error to Criminal Court, Cook County; Joseph Burke, Judge.

Joseph Rappaport was convicted of murder, and he brings error.

Affirmed.Clarence Darrow, William W. Smith, William L. Carlin, and Edward M. Keating, all of Chicago, for plaintiff in error.

Otto Kerner, Atty. Gen., Thomas J. Courtney, State's Atty., of Chicago, and A. B. Dennis, of Danville (Edward E. Wilson, John T. Gallagher, Richard H. Devine, Melvin Rembe, E. I. Harrington, and John S. Boyle, all of Chicago, of counsel), for the People.

ORR, Justice.

Joseph Rappaport, thirty years of age, was convicted by a jury in the criminal court of Cook county of the murder of Max Dent, and his punishment fixed at death. Motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment were overruled, and defendant was sentenced to be executed on February 14, 1936. His execution was stayed when this writ of error was sued out seeking reversal of the judgment of conviction.

The killing of Dent happened in Chicago about midway of the block between Nineteenth street and Ogden avenue, in front of 1918 South Lawndale avenue, on the west side of the street. At about 7:50 p. m., October 8, 1935, he was shot and killed on the sidewalk there, dying almost instantly. Dent was then thirty-four years of age and lived with his father and mother at 1859 South Lawndale avenue, which was just north of West Nineteenth street. He had dined with his father and mother and left the house at approximately 7:30 p. m., on October 8. Defendant, Rappaport, had been previously indicted in the United States District Court for unlawfully selling narcotics to Max Dent, the deceased, a crime alleged to have happened on February 4, 1935, in Chicago. Dent was the principal witness against defendant in the federal court case, and that fact was alleged by the people to be the motive for the killing of Dent.

Joe Dent, father of the deceased, as a witness for the people, testified briefly to the fact that the deceased had dined at home, was alive and well at the time on the night of October 8, 1935, and that he later identified his body lying dead in the county morgue.

The people offered two exhibits: No. 1, a plat showing the vicinity of the homicide, and No. 2, a certified copy of an indictment in the District Court of the United States of America, Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, February term, 1935, consisting of two counts. The first count charged that ‘Joseph Rappaport, hereinafter called defendant, late of the city of Chicago, in the division and district aforesaid, on, to-wit, February 4, 1935, at Chicago, aforesaid, in said division and district, knowingly, willfully, unlawfully and feloniously did sell to one Max Dent, for a large sum of money, towit, the sum of $20, a large quantity of a certain derivative of opium, to-wit, 62 grains heroin hydrochloride, not in pursuance of a written order from said Max Dent on a form issued in blank for that purpose by the commissioner of internal revenue; against the peace and dignity of the United States, and contrary to the form of the statute of the same in such case made and provided.’ This was read in evidence and sent with the jury during their deliberation. It was conceded that defendant, Joseph Rappaport, was the person named therein, and that the defendant, Rappaport, was arrested on February 4, 1935, by the federal agents, and that the deceased, Max Dent, was present at the time of defendant's arrest.

Annie Dent, mother of the deceased, testified for the people in chief, that the deceased left home about 7:30 p. m., on the night of the homicide; that she followed him; that when she came out of the house, on the east side of Lawndale avenue, north of Nineteenth street, she walked south. She testified she saw her son coming toward her when he was under the elevated structure, which is south of Ogden avenue. She said she walked slowly and saw her son coming; that all of a sudden she saw Joe Rappaport upon the same side of the street; that as soon as she passed the alley there he began to run; that her son wanted to come home from the drug store; that she walked toward her son, going south, and he was walking north, both on the east side of Lawndale; that she saw Joe Rappaport in the light and he began to chase Max; that Max went across Lawndale and she ran across, too, in the same direction; that she was about five or six feet from him; that then another man came against him and stopped him. When that occurred she said Rappaport began to shoot. She testified: ‘I heard five—four shots. He shot at the boy, who covered his face with both hands; he fell down to the sidewalk; Rappaport come right on, the head on him, took a couple of seconds and fired the fifth shot while my son was lying on the sidewalk, and they both run away in the passageway, which was about where the boy was lying.’ She then identified Joseph Rappaport, and stated she had known him since 1928. She testified, over the objection of defendant, that Rappaport came to her house in 1934 about a half dozen times; that he brought something with him which she received, a little package in a little silk envelope, to give to Max; and that she gave him $3 for it. She further testified, over objection, that three different times she received packages from Rappaport to give to her son and gave Rappaport money for them; that she had once opened up one of the envelopes and found it to contain six little capsules containing white powder; and that Rappaport told her she should give that to Max, which she did. She related that Rappaport once stayed at her home for two days; that on October 8, 1935, her son left the house about 7:30 to get her some medicine, because she was ill; that she went out about five minutes after he left, to see that no harm came to him; that she did not know he had been working for the government agents or that he was in the business of ‘turning people in’ for the government agents and getting pay for it, but she feared he was going to have trouble with Joe Rappaport; and that was in her mind when she left her home that evening to follow him.

Clarence Stachowiak, thirteen years of age, testified that around 8 o'clock on the night of October 8, 1935, he was sitting at the southeast corner of Nineteenth street and Lawndale and saw Mrs. Dent on the east side of the same street, going south toward Ogden avenue; that about two minutes after she passed him he heard several bangs; that he could not tell what direction they came from, but after sitting there awhile he saw a group of people, went over there, and saw a man lying on the sidewalk about three or four minutes after he had heard the bangs; that he learned later the man on the walk was Max Dent, and identified Mrs. Dent as the woman who had passed him a minute and a half or two minutes before he heard the noise.

William Fenn, a police officer assigned to the Lawndale station, testified that about 8 o'clock on the night of October 8, 1935, they were notified at the station that there had been a shooting at 1918 South Lawndale; that he immediately went there and found the deceased lying on the sidewalk in front of 1918 South Lawndale; that ‘while at the scene I saw Mrs. Dent. She came from the north and got to the point where the body was, and she said ‘that is my son’ and lifted the rubber covering.' On cross-examination this witness testified that Mrs. Dent made a statement to him that night at her home, telling him ‘she saw the shooting, she ran over toward it, and that someone said to her it was not her son, and she said something of the sort like that she came home and asked her husband if the son was there.’ He remembered also that she said she ran and asked the father if Max was home, and that the father said he was not there, and then she ran back to the scene and looked at the body and identified it as her son. He also admitted testifying at the coroner's inquest to another story, that is, ‘to the first story she gave me immediately after the incident.’

It was stipulated that the coroner's physician of Cook county would testify, if called as a witness, that on October 9, 1935, he performed a post mortem examination on the body of Max Dent; that there was a bullet would through the cheek on the right side, at the angle of the jaw, through the neck; that there was a bullet wound through the abdomen; and that in his opinion the death of Max Dent was the result of the bullet wound in the neck and bullet wound in the body.

Other evidence was introduced by the people for the purpose of showing a motive on the part of Rappaport to slay Dent, the informer and witness against him. This evidence consisted of the testimony of three federal anti-narcotic agents, who detailed, over objections, their use of Dent to secure the proof which resulted in the indictment of Rappaport in the United States District Court.

In behalf of defendant it is admitted that the indictment against him in the federal court was properly introduced in evidence for the purpose of showing motive and intent, but it is insisted that the trial court erred in permitting detailed evidence of all the circumstances leading up to the arrest of Rappaport to be shown. The case of People v. Borella, 362 Ill. 218, 199 N.E. 113, is cited in support of this contention; but there the proof was that defendants knew the property was stolen and they had been associated with the thieves in other crimes, so the facts are not comparable to the case at bar. A case more nearly in point, from which defendant can derive no satisfaction, is People v. Spaulding, 309 Ill. 292, 141 N.E. 196. There Spaulding was on trial for the murder of a constable, and this court laid down the rule that if the evidence offered in a criminal case is relevant and tends to prove a material fact pertaining to the issue it is not rendered...