Sault v. People

• Citation: 3 Colo.App. 502,34 P. 263
• Court: Court of Appeals of Colorado
• Decision Date: 25 September 1893
• Parties: SAULT v. PEOPLE.

34 P. 263

3 Colo.App. 502

SAULT v. PEOPLE.

Court of Appeals of Colorado

September 25, 1893

Error to district court, Arapahoe county.

Samuel H. Sault, having been convicted of receiving stolen property brings error. Reversed.

Robert W. Bonynge, for plaintiff in error.

Eugene Engley, Atty. Gen., for the People.

THOMSON J.

Samuel H. Sault, plaintiff in error, was convicted of receiving stolen goods. The information upon which he was tried charges that he received the property from some person to the district attorney unknown. The principal witness for the prosecution was one Charles Edwards, who swore that he stole the goods, and sold them to the defendant Sault. He also testified that, before the information was drawn, he was in the office of the district attorney and told him that he had stolen the goods, and sold them to Sault that he made this statement to Col. Dennison. The record shows that Dennison was the deputy district attorney, who verified the information. There was no other evidence on that point in the case made by the prosecution. At the close of the case for the people, counsel for defendant, Sault, moved the court to discharge the defendant, for the reason that the information charged that the goods were received by Sault from some person to the district attorney unknown, whereas the testimony showed that at the time the information was prepared the name of the person from whom the goods were received was known to the district attorney. The motion was denied. This was error. "As it is required in indictments, that the names of the persons injured, and of all others whose existence is legally essential to the charge, be set forth, if known, it is, of course, material that they be precisely proved as laid. Thus, the name of the legal owner, general or special, of the goods stolen or intended to be stolen, must be alleged and proven. And if the person be described as one whose name is to the jurors unknown, and it be proven that he was known, the variance is fatal, and the person will be acquitted." 3 Greenl.Ev. § 22. "Where a third person cannot be described by name it is enough to charge him as a certain person to the jurors aforesaid unknown, which, as will presently be seen, is correct, if the party was at the time of the indictment unknown to the grand jury, though he became known afterwards. *** But if the third party's name be known to the grand jury, or could have been...