State v. Armstrong

• Decision Date: 02 December 1902
• Citation: 70 S.W. 874,170 Mo. 406
• Parties: STATE v. ARMSTRONG.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

70 S.W. 874

170 Mo. 406

STATE v. ARMSTRONG.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 2.

December 2, 1902.

BURGLARY AND LARCENY — CONVICTION — SUFFICIENCY OF EVIDENCE — POSSESSION OF STOLEN PROPERTY — PRESUMPTION — ADMISSIBILITY OF EVIDENCE.

1. Evidence in a prosecution for burglary and larceny examined, and held sufficient to sustain a conviction.

2. Possession of stolen property three days after its taking is sufficient to raise a presumption of guilt.

3. The presumption of guilt arising from the possession of stolen goods applies as well in the case of burglary as larceny.

4. Evidence in a prosecution for burglary and larceny, showing possession of stolen property three days after its taking, of an admission made by one defendant as to what had become of part of the stolen goods, and that a witness had met defendants on the road from the place of the crime to the town where they were found three days later, is properly admitted.

Appeal from circuit court, Webster county; Argus Cox, Judge.

Charles and Winfield Armstrong were convicted of burglary and larceny, and Charles Armstrong appeals. Affirmed.

Prosecution for burglary and larceny, the defendants in the indictment being young men and brothers. Indictment in proper form. On the 20th day of July, 1900, Mr. Hargus, a citizen of Webster county, who lives about eight miles east of Marshfield took his family and went to a neighbor's to assist in threshing. When they returned home that evening they found that a window of the house had been pried up, the residence entered, and some articles of clothing and a purse containing $3.25 in money taken. Defendants were seen to pass Mr. Hargus' home during that day, and investigation resulted in finding them at the home of a brother at Lebanon three days after the burglary. They were each wearing some of the goods or clothing they had secured from Mr. Hargus' home, and had some of the small trinkets in their possession. The testimony proved admissions they had made, and also their effort afterwards to hide some of the clothing they had taken. The defense entered was that of an alibi, alleging that they were in the woods during that day, at work making ties. However, they failed to account for the possession of the property entirely, though they undertook to account for it partially; and the jury found them both guilty, and assessed the penalty of each at 3 years for the burglary and 2 years for the larceny. Winfield Armstrong, one of the defendants in...