People v. Rhodes

• Decision Date: 18 April 1923
• Docket Number: No. 15167.,15167.
• Citation: 308 Ill. 146,139 N.E. 53
• Parties: PEOPLE v. RHODES.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

308 Ill. 146

139 N.E. 53

PEOPLE

v.RHODES.

No. 15167.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

April 18, 1923.

Error to Appellate Court, First District, on Error to Criminal Court, Cook County; C. M. Thomson, Judge.

Janie Rholdes was convicted of receiving stolen property, and brings error.

Reversed and remanded, with directions.Darrow, Sissman, Holly & Carlin, of Chicago, for plaintiff in error.

Edward J. Brundage, Atty. Gen., Robert E. Crown, State's Atty., of Chicage, and Floyd E. Britton, of Springfield (Edward E. Wilson and Clyde C. Fisher, both of Chicago, of counsel), for the People.

DUNN, J.

At the June term, 1920, of the criminal court of Cook county, an indictment was returned charging Janie Rhodes with the larceny on August 16, 1918, of 530,000 feet of gas, of the value of 85 cents per 1,000 feet, the property of the People's Gaslight & Coke Company. A second count charged her with receiving and aiding in concealing the same gas, knowing it to be stolen, for her own gain, and to prevent the owner from again possessing its property. There was a trial on a plea of not guilty, and a verdict of guilty of receiving stolen property of the value of $14.99. Motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment were overruled, and the defendant was sentenced on the verdict. The Appellate Court affirmed the judgment, and the defendant has sued out a writ of error to reverse both judgments.

On motion of the people the Appellate Court struck from the record the bill of exceptions, and the cause was disposed of on the common-law record only. The conviction was for a misdemeanor. It is contended that the judgment should have been arrested because the indictment charged the offense to have been committed on August 16, 1918, more than 18 months before the return of the indictment. The plaintiff in error therefore stands convicted of a misdemeanor which the indictment shows on its face was committed at such a time that the limitation established by law for its prosecution had expired before the return of the indictment. An indictment which charges the commission of an offense on a date prior to the period of limitation is bad on its face and should be quashed. Garrison v. People, 87 Ill. 96;Lamkin v. People, 94 Ill. 501;People v. Weinstein, 255 Ill. 530, 99 N. E. 589;People v. Hallberg, 259 Ill. 502, 102 N. E. 1005. This indictment, however, was not subject to a motion to quash for it verdict a felony. It is argued that, when the verdict was returned finding the plaintiff in error guilty of a misdemeanor, a motion in arrest of judgment for the insufficiency of the indictment to sustain a judgment of conviction for the misdemeanor should have been sustained. The indictment was, however, a good indictment for larceny, which was sufficient to sustain a conviction for larceny of any amount.

Every indictment must allege the commission of the offense on a certain date which must be within the time fixed by law for the prosecution of the offense, and this indictment did so. It is not necessary, however, to prove the precise date alleged. On the trial the date averred means any time within the statute of limitations, but in determining the sufficiency of the indictment upon motion to quash the date alleged must be taken as the true one. Dreyer v. People, 176 Ill. 590, 52 N. E. 372; People v. Weinstein, supra. Under this indictment it was proper to prove the offense charged at any time within 3 years before the return of the indictment, but if it was shown that the offense was committed more than 18 months before the return of the indictment, and that the value of the gas was $15 or less, plaintiff in error was entitled to have the jury instructed that they should return a verdict of not guilty, if they found these facts from the evidence. At common law a defective indictment was not aided by a verdict, as defective pleadings in civil cases are. 4 Blackstone's Com. 375. By statutes, however, in England, and in most other jurisdictions, formal defects which would formerly have been fatal may now be disregarded, and the doctrine of aider by verdict applies in the same manner in criminal as in civil cases.

Section 9 of division 11 of our Criminal Code (Hurd's Rev. St. 1921, c. 38, § 411) provides that no motion in arrest of judgment or writ of error shall be sustained for anythingnot affecting the real merits of the offense charged in the indictment. In People v. Darr, 262 Ill. 202, 104 N. E. 389, it was said that there was no motion to quash the indictment, and its sufficiency was therefore to be determined without regarding any defect which is cured by the verdict. It was held that a motion in arrest of judgment cannot be sustained for any matter not affecting the real merits of the offense charged, in Young v. People, 193 Ill. 236, 61 N. E. 1104, and Nichols v. People, 40 Ill. 395. The people were entitled, under this indictment, to prove the defendant guilty of larceny, whether the amount was $15, or more, or less, at any time within the statute of limitations (Hurd's Rev. St. 1921, c. 83), whether that was 3 years or 18...