State v. Adams
| Decision Date | 27 December 1894 |
| Parties | STATE. v. ADAMS et al. |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
Larceny—What Constitutes—Knowledge and Consent of Owner of Property.
1. One who forms the intent to steal, and carries out such design, is guilty, though the owner is advised of the intended larceny, appoints agents to watch such person, and allows him to commit it, with a view of having him punished.
2. Where the agent of the owner of certain property tells a servant to persuade a person to steal such property, and he does so, and the property is taken by such person, the latter is not guilty of larceny, though he previously formed the intent to steal it.
3. Larceny cannot be committed when the owner, through his agent, consents to the taking and asportation, though the consent is given for the purpose of apprehending the felon.
4. Larceny cannot be committed unless the thing be taken against the will of the owner.
Appeal from criminal court, Mecklenburg county; Meares, Judge.
William Adams and Sue Adams were convicted of larceny, and appeal. Reversed.
Clarkson & Duls and Maxwell & Keerans, for appellants.
The Attorney General, for the State.
The court correctly told the Jury that "if there was the guilty intent previously formed by the defendant to steal cer tain property, and he carried out such design previously formed, he is guilty, notwithstanding the owner of the property was advised of the intended larceny, appointed agents to watch him, and could have prevented the theft, but did not do so, and allowed him to commit the theft with a view of having him subsequently punished." It was error, however, further to tell them that if there was the previous intent to steal the defendant would be guilty, notwithstanding the owner's agent had told a servant to go to the defendant's house, and persuade him to come and steal the sack. Dodd v. Hamilton, 4 N. C. 471; State v. Barna, 4 N. C. 483.
It was also error to refuse the fifth prayer for instruction, "that larceny cannot be committed when the owner, through his agent consents to the taking and asportation, though such consent was given for the purpose of apprehending the felon, " and likewise the sixth prayer, "that larceny cannot be committed unless the thing be taken against the will of the owner." The object of the law is to prevent larceny by punishing it, not to procure the commission of a larceny that the offender may be punished. The evidence for the state was that the owner's agent, Wilson, having information of an intended theft of cotton by the defendants, watched the cotton house Monday and Tuesday nights, without any one coming; that he returned Wednesday night, and watched till very late, and, no one coming, he filled up a couple of sacks with cotton, and, leaving one of the sacks in the cotton house, he gave the other sack to one Julia Harris, and told her to go to the defendant's house, 300 yards distant, and give it to him, and tell him that he could get some more cotton. Julia did as directed, and in a little while she returned with the defendant, who entered the cotton house, took the other sack of cotton upon his shoulders, and carried it home. The court should have sustained the demurrer to the evidence.
It is not necessary to consider the evidence as to the wife,...
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Sorrells v. United States
...of consent of the person affected is an essential element of the crime, and where the inducement supplies the consent. State v. Adams, 115 N. C. 775, 20 S. E. 722; U. S. v. Whittier, 5 Dill. 35, Fed. Cas. No. 16,688; Rex v. McDaniel, Fost. Crown Law 121, 2 East P. C. 665. But as said by Jud......
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Sorrells v. United States
...36 Am.St.Rep. 295; Williams v. State of Georgia, 55 Ga. 391; United States v. Whittier, 5 Dill. 35, Fed. Cas. No. 16,688; State v. Adams, 115 N.C. 775, 20 S.E. 722. There may also be physical conditions which are essential to the offense and which do not exist in the case of a trap, as, for......
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State v. Burnette, 435
...him in the perpetration of the crime which had its genesis in his own mind. State v. Hughes, 208 N.C. 542, 181 S.E. 737; State v. Adams, 115 N.C. 775, 20 S.E. 722; Soreells v. U. S., supra; Grimm v. U. S., 156 U.S. 604, 15 S.Ct. 470, 39 L.Ed. 550; State v. Marquardt, supra; Butts v. U. S., ......
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Jenkins v. Fowler
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