People v. Schneider

• Court: Illinois Supreme Court
• Writing for the Court: PER CURIAM.
• Citation: People v. Schneider , 345 Ill. 410, 178 N.E. 84 (Ill. 1931)
• Decision Date: 23 October 1931
• Docket Number: No. 20600.,20600.
• Parties: PEOPLE v. SCHNEIDER et al.

345 Ill. 410

178 N.E. 84

PEOPLE

v.SCHNEIDER et al.

No. 20600.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Oct. 23, 1931.

Commissioner's Opinion.

Error to Circuit Court, McHenry County; E. D. Shurtleff, Judge.

George Schneider, Jr., and others were convicted of conspiracy to violate the Prohibition Act. To review a judgment of the Appellate Court, affirming the judgment of conviction, defendants bring error.

Judgment of the Appellate Court affirmed.Martin M. Ward, of Chicago, and David R. Joslyn, Jr., of Woodstock, for plaintiffs in error.

Oscar E. Carlstrom, Atty. Gen., Charles W. Hadley, Sp. State's Atty., of Wheaton, and S. S. DuHamel and J. J. Neiger, both of Springfield (Charles P. Barnes, of Woodstock, of counsel), for the People.

EDMUNDS, C.

The grand jury of McHenry county returned an indictment against George Schneider, Jr., Michael Schneider, and Henry Sohst, charging them with conspiracy to violate the Illinois Prohibition Act. Motions to quash the indictment and for a bill of particulars were overruled. A jury trial was had in the circuit court of McHenry county, and the jury returned separate verdicts as to each of the defendants, finding them guilty of a conspiracy in manner and form as charged in the indictment. The court sentenced George Schneider, Jr., to imprisonment at the Illinois state farm for a period of twelve months and to pay a fine of $2,000, and imposed upon Michael Schneider and Sohst sentences of imprisonment at the state farm for a period of twelve months and fines of $1,000. The Appellate Court for the Second District affirmed the judgment, and by writ of error the defendants have brought the record to this court for review.

The indictment under which the conviction of plaintiffs in error was had contained two counts. After naming plaintiffs in error, the first count alleged that ‘each of said defendants, then and there not having first secured a permit from the government of the United States of America or its duly authorized officer thereof, or from the Attorney General of the State of Illinois, or from the commissioner of prohibition of the State of Illinois, and being then and there not a duly authorized and bona fide registered pharmacist, local registered pharmacist, registered assistant pharmacist, druggist, physician, dentist, chemist, veterinary surgeon, person conducting a bona fide hospital or sanitarium engaged in the treatment of persons suffering from alcoholism or other diseases or ailments, persons conducting a bona fide laboratory for scientific research or for scientific purposes, minister of the gosper, priest, rabbi, officer duly authorized by any church, congregation, conference, diocese or ecclesiastical jurisdiction for the purpose of selling,purchasing, manufacturing, transporting or disposing of sacramental wines, and with unlawful intent then and there to violate the Illinois Prohibition act, unlawfully, willfully, knowingly, fraudulently and deceitfully did conspire, combine, confederate and agree together, with each other and with divers other persons whose names are to the said grand jurors unknown, with the fraudulent and malicious intent unlawfully, wrongfully and wickedly to then and there do illegal acts injurious to the administration of public justice and injurious to the public police and public morals, good order and welfare, that is to say, then and there unlawfully, willfully and knowingly to commit an offense against the People of the State of Illinois, that is to say, the offense of unlawfully, willfully and knowingly manufacturing, selling, bartering, transporting, delivering, possessing and furnishing in McHenry county aforesaid, in violation of the Illinois Prohibition act, for beverage purposes, large quantities of intoxicating liquor, to-wit, whiskey, wine, beer and distilled spirits, all of which should then and there be fit for use for beverage purposes and all of which should contain one-half of one percentum, and more, of alcohol by volume, being then and there not any of the articles or preparations enumerated in paragraphs (a), (b), (c), (d), (e) and (f) of section four (4) of said Illinois Prohibition act, said manufacturing, selling, bartering, transporting, delivering, possessing and furnishing of intoxicating liquor, as aforesaid, being then and there unlawful and prohibited, contrary to the form of the statute in such case made and provided and against the peace and dignity of the same People of the State of Illinois.’ The second count was similar in form and content, except that, instead of charging conspiracy to commit the offense of ‘manufacturing, selling, bartering, transporting, delivering, possessing and furnishing’ intoxicating liquor, it charged conspiracy to ‘unlawfully, willfully and knowingly keep, operate and maintain a common nuisance by manufacturing, selling, bartering, transporting, delivering, possessing and furnishing in a certain house, building, structure and place in the said county of McHenry, in the State of Illinois aforesaid, in violation of the Illinois Prohibition act, for beverage purposes,’ intoxicating liquor.

The first contention of plaintiffs in error is that the trial court erred in overruling their motion to quash the indictment. In support of this contention they argue at great length that it is impossible to say whether the indictment alleges a conspiracy under section 46 of the Criminal Code (Cahill's Stat. 1929, c. 38, par. 116), or a conspiracy under ‘An Act to define and punish conspiracies in the State of Illinois' (Cahill's Stat. 1929, c. 38, par. 117); that the indictment ‘contains no facts or descriptive acts showing the circumstances under which the supposed conspiracy to violate the Illinois Prohibition Act was intended to be carried out,’ and that, assuming the indictment was intended to charge conspiracy under section 46 of the Criminal Code, its allegations are not sufficient to show the commission by plaintiffs in error of any offense thereunder. We are not impressed by the argument that it is impossible to say whether the indictment alleges a conspiracy under section 46 or the other statute cited, and that therefore it should have been quashed. Section 46 provides: ‘If any two or more persons conspire or agree together * * * to do any illegal act injurious to the public trade, health, morals, police, or administration of public justice * * * they shall be deemed guilty of a conspiracy.’ The other statute contains no such provision. It does, on the other hand, contain a provision specifying as an element of the crime that one or more of the parties charged do an act to effect the object of the conspiracy. Under section 46 the crime of conspiracy is complete without such act. Section 46 is not in any way modified or repealed by the other statute. Ochs v. People, 124 Ill. 399, 16 N. E. 662. It is not necessary, in an indictment undera public statute, to recite it or specifically refer to it. Commonwealth v. Hoye, 11 Gray (Mass.) 462. Having in mind these considerations, an inspection of the indictment shows the argument of plaintiffs in error to be without foundation. Ochs v. People, supra.

In People v. Poindexter, 243 Ill. 68, 90 N. E. 261, it was pointed out that section 46 is directed against conspiracies of different kinds. One kind is a conspiracy to commit a felony of any kind. Another kind is a conspiracy to do an illegal act injurious to the public health, morals, police, or the administration of public justice, and such a conspiracy is punishable under this section only when the illegal act is of such a character that it appears to be injurious to the public trade, health, morals, police, or the administration of public justice. It is with the latter kind of conspiracy that the present case deals. Therefore, not only must there be alleged in the indictment sufficient to show that the act which is the object of the conspiracy is illegal, but there must also be sufficient to show that the illegal act is injurious in some one or more of the respects indicated by the statute.

By the statutes of this state, to manufacture, sell, barter, transport, deliver, furnish, or possess intoxicating liquor is, with certain defined exceptions, an unlawful act, and it is likewise an unlawful act to maintain a place where intoxicating liquor is manufactured, sold, kept, or bartered. Cahill's Stat. 1929, c. 43, par. 1 et seq. The offense charged in the counts of the present indictment clearly being conspiracy to do these acts, from the standpoint of showing the proposed act to be illegal the indictment is sufficient and further allegation is unnecessary. It has long been settled that, where the act to be accomplished by the conspiracy is illegal, there is no necessity for setting out in the indictment the means by which it was intended to be accomplished. Smith v. People, 25 Ill. 9, 76 Am. Dec. 780;Thomas v. People, 113 Ill. 531. The gist of the matter was clearly expressed in People v. Blumenberg, 271 Ill. 180, 110 N. E. 788, 789, where it was said: ‘The essence of the offense is not the accomplishment of the unlawful object, but it is the unlawful combination or agreement to accomplish the criminal or unlawful purpose. It is unnecessary to prove any overt act toward the accomplishment of the unlawful purpose. The offense is complete when the agreement is made, although no act is done toward carrying it into effect. The means to be employed to accomplish the unlawful purpose may never have been disclosed, or may never have been agreed upon, so that they could not be stated, and yet the offense would be complete, and might be proved by overt acts or other circumstances.’

Is the indictment sufficient in the sense that it charges a conspiracy to do illegal acts which are injurious to the administration of public justice and injurious to the...