Stanley v. United States

• Decision Date: 29 March 1912
• Docket Number: 3,601.
• Citation: 195 F. 896
• Parties: STANLEY et al. v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

195 F. 896

STANLEY et al. v. UNITED STATES.

No. 3,601.

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

March 29, 1912

Horace Speed (J. R. Cottingham, S. T. Bledsoe, and John Devereux, on the brief), for plaintiffs in error.

John Embry, U.S. Atty. (George F. Zimmerman, Asst. U.S. Atty., on the brief), for the United States.

Before SANBORN and ADAMS, Circuit Judges, and WM. H. MUNGER District judge.

WM. H MUNGER, District Judge.

The grand jury of the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma returned an indictment against plaintiffs in error, a copy of which embraces 37 pages of the printed record, and is too voluminous to be here set forth in full.

It however, charges, in substance, that on the 14th day of March, 1904, within the county of Texas, state of Oklahoma in the Western District of said state of Oklahoma, J. E Stanley, whose more full name is to the grand jurors unknown, A. J. Kline, whose more full name is to the grand jurors unknown, R. A. Porter, whose more full name is to the grand jurors unknown, and W. T. Douglas, now deceased, whose more full name is to the grand jurors unknown, and divers other persons to the grand jurors unknown, hereinafter referred to as other conspirators to the grand jurors unknown, then and there being, did then and there, at and within said county and district, and within the jurisdiction of said court, unlawfully, willfully, corruptly, wrongfully, feloniously, and knowingly conspire, combine, confederate, and agree together to commit an offense against the United States; that is, to commit the acts made a crime and offense against the United States by section 5480 of the Revised Statutes of the United States (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 3696, and the acts amendatory thereof, that is to say:

That said (naming conspirators) did there and then unlawfully, willfully, knowingly, corruptly, falsely, wickedly, and feloniously conspire, combine, confederate, and agree together, in devising a certain scheme and artifice to defraud various persons, then resident within the United States, to wit, to defraud Mary Lanigan, W. F. Garrett, D.C. O'Neil, Frank Saxton, J. L. Graham, W. D. faulkner, Charles P. Johnson, W. L. Garvin, J. J. Macham, Matt Raichel, L. A. Wood, and W. E. Townsend, whose more full names are to the grand jurors unknown, and divers other persons to the grand jurors unknown, hereinafter referred to as other victims to the grand jurors unknown, of their money, to be effected through and by means of the post office establishment of the United States, by them the said (naming conspirators) opening and intending to open, under the style and firm name of the Southwestern Immigration & Development Company, with offices and headquarters at Guymon, Okl., correspondence and communication with said other persons (naming persons defrauded), and by inciting such other persons, to wit (naming persons defrauded), to open communication with them the said (naming conspirators), under the style and firm name aforesaid, by means of the post office establishment of the United States, which said artifice and scheme to defraud was as follows, to wit: That they the said (naming conspirators) should and did associate themselves together, under the style and firm name of the Southwestern Immigration & Development Company, as the promoters of a new town, to wit, the townsite of Boise City, Cimarron county, Okl., as persons selling the town lots of said townsite, with the said J. E. Stanley as president, the said A. J. Kline as vice president and general manager, the said W. T. Douglas as treasurer, and the said R. A. Porter as general sales manager, of said company, and that they, acting under the style and firm name aforesaid, would open correspondence and communication with the said (naming parties defrauded) by means of the post office establishment of the United States, and incite said other persons, to wit (naming parties defrauded), to open communication with and to send to the Southwestern Immigration & Development Company at Guymon, Okl., and to open communication with and to send to the said (naming conspirators) applications to purchase, and large sums of money for the purchase of lots in the said town of Boise City, to wit, written applications for the purchase of lots in said Boise City, the location of said lots, respectively, to be determined at the grand opening at the price of $40 per lot, and to send with such applications $10 on the purchase price and $10 per month thereafter for each such lot until the full sum of $40 per lot was paid, by them the said (naming conspirators) falsely pretending in and through letters, packets, writings, circulars, pamphlets, advertisements, maps, and plats, to be deposited and carried in and delivered by the mails by means of the post office establishment of the United States, which said letters, circulars, packets, writings, pamphlets, advertisements, maps, and plats are too lengthy and voluminous and otherwise unfit to be set forth in this indictment, and knowingly, fraudulently, and falsely making and publishing through said letters, circulars, maps, plats, pamphlets, writings, and advertisements the false and fraudulent pretenses and representations following, to wit: That the said Boise City was owned in fee simple by the said Southwestern Immigration & Development Company; that the said Boise City was laid off in a square plat, composed of only one quarter section of land, to wit, the N.W. 1/4 of section 15, township 3 N., of range 5 E., in Cimarron county, Okl. That in the center thereof a block of land had been reserved for the erection of a capitol or courthouse of Cimarron county. That all of said lots offered and to be offered for sale were within the exterior limits of the one quarter section of land, and were within four blocks of this courthouse square. That the said Boise City was the only town in said Cimarron county. That the said Boise City had secured the division point and Oklahoma shops for the new Panhandle Short Line, which is now under construction, 23 miles having been graded. (It then charged that other lines of railroad were being financed and would pass through said Boise City, and would give certain connections.) That there is a family on every quarter section in said county. That every quarter section of land within 25 miles of Boise City is occupied by a farmer. It also set forth representations as to various kinds of crops grown in the county. That, when the whole of said lots should be sold and payments therefor made, a grand opening would be had at which the said lots would be apportioned and distributed to purchasers respectively according to some method to be agreed upon, and that the said Southwestern Immigration & Development Company would pay one full return fare for each five lots purchased of a representative of the purchasers, to attend the grand opening. That none of said lots were a greater distance from said courthouse site and the prospective business section of said town than the exterior limits of the said one quarter section of land. All of which said false and fraudulent pretenses and representations were to be made and published as aforesaid for the purpose of inducing purchasers who had not visited said Boise City or known the value of said lots to believe that said lots and all of them were well worth the price to be asked therefor, and to purchase the same.

Whereas in truth and in fact, the said lots so to be offered for sale and to be sold would be of far less value than as so represented and not of the worth and value for which the same would be sold; and whereas in truth and in fact, as the said (naming conspirators) then and there well knew, the said Southwestern Immigration & Development Company did not and would not own said townsite of Boise City nor said land in fee simple, and that it was not and would not be so owned or held in fee simple by said (naming conspirators), or by either or any of them, or by any other person, persons, or corporation for them, or either of them, or for the said Southwestern Immigration & Development Company, or for the purchasers thereof; and whereas, in truth and in fact, they the said (naming conspirators) intended, as a part of said scheme and artifice to defraud, as they and each of them then well knew, to survey and plat into lots and blocks, and to sell, under the style and firm name aforesaid, as lots in said Boise City, the whole of the west one-half of said section 15, and that the first platting of said townsite into a square form, containing only one quarter section of said land, with a block reserved in the center thereof for the erection of a courthouse, would be for the false and fraudulent purpose of inducing purchasers of lots to believe that the lots selected or to be selected for them would necessarily be within that...