Sharp v. State
| Decision Date | 04 June 1891 |
| Parties | SHARP v. STATE. |
| Court | New Jersey Supreme Court |
(Syllabus by the Court.)
Error to court of quarter sessions, Gloucester county; Beckett, Jones, and Stratton, Judges.
Argued at February term, 1891, before the Chief Justice, and Dixon, Magie, and Garrison, JJ.
A. H. Swackhamer, for plaintiff in error.
B. Perry, for the State.
The plaintiff in error, Sharp, was convicted in the Gloucester sessions, upon an indictment charging him with having procured the indorsement of one Cunard upon his promissory note by false pretenses, and with intent to defraud. Sharp, by this writ of error, seeks a reversal of the conviction, and has assigned numerous errors upon the record and proceedings. Two of the assignments present such unmistakable error that it is plain that the judgment cannot stand.
In the first place, the false pretenses charged in the indictment were not proved; and the court below, upon Sharp's request, at the close of the case, ought to have directed an acquittal. The indictment was drawn upon section 172 of the crimes act. It charged that Sharp, intending to cheat and defraud Cunard of his money, etc., by certain false pretenses made to Cunard, procured him to indorse Sharp's note, in order that it might be used as valuable security. The false pretense was charged to be false statements that Sharp was the owner of property of large value, and that such property was not incumbered by any lien. The only statements proved in support of these allegations of the indictment were made in a conversation between Cunard and Sharp, to which they alone testified. Their testimony was contradictory. Assuming Cunard's testimony to be true, what occurred was this: Cunard asked Sharp whether he owned his personal property, and Sharp replied," I do not owe a dollar to any man." Cunard then asked Sharp what kind of a season he had had, and Sharp answered that he had made a "middling fair" season. Cunard declared that these representations induced him to indorse the note in question. There was no proof of the charge that Sharp had stated that he was the owner of property of large value. Not did the conversation as detailed by Cunard suffice to prove the other charge,—that Sharp stated that his property was not incumbered by any lien. The indictment charged a particular false pretense. It will not be supported by proof or general statement, though the latter be false. There was therefore a substantial variance...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
State v. Samurine
...to prove the existence of this element compels acquittal even though a misrepresentation may in fact have been made. Sharp v. State, 53 N.J.L. 511, 21 A. 1026 (Sup.Ct.1891). There is nothing in the record to establish guilty knowledge or, for that matter, misrepresentation or an intention t......
-
State v. Lamoreaux, A--672
...to the allegations of the indictment and that a material variance is fatal. Wharton, supra, § 1483. For example, in Sharp v. State, 53 N.J.L. 511, 21 A. 1026 (Sup.Ct.1891), the indictment charged that the defendant persuaded the complainant to endorse his note by falsely pretending that his......
-
State v. Greco
...defraud.' Under the statute a fraudulent intent is necessary to ripen a mere misrepresentation into a criminal act. Sharp v. State, 53 N.J.L. 511, 21 A. 1026 (Sup.Ct.1891); 35 C.J.S. False Pretenses § 23; 22 Am.Jur., False Pretenses, § Recognizing the burden of its obligation to prove the e......
-
State v. Adams
... ... The presentation of ... false accounts is false pretenses. (7 Am. & Eng. Ency. of ... Law, p. 754.) To authorize a conviction it must be shown that ... the prisoner knew the representations actually made to be ... false and that he intended to defraud. (Sharp v ... State, 53 N.J.L. 511, 21 A. 1026; People v ... Wakely, 62 Mich. 297, 28 N.W. 871; 6 Lawson's ... Criminal Defenses, pp. 1033-1035; citing Bracey v ... State, 64 Miss. 26, 8 So. 165.) The representation must ... not be obviously false, else no recovery or conviction can be ... had. (2 ... ...