State v. Fisher

• Decision Date: 21 June 1921
• Docket Number: No. 21.,21.
• Citation: 114 A. 247
• Parties: STATE v. FISHER.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

114 A. 247

STATE

v. FISHER.

No. 21.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

June 21, 1921.

Error to Court of Quarter Sessions, Somerset County.

Edward S. Fisher was convicted of fraudulent conversion for his own use of moneys intrusted to him by his client, and he brings error. Reversed.

Argued February term, 1921, before GUMMERE, C. J., and BERGEN and KATZENBACH, JJ.

Frederick A. Pope, of Somerville, for plaintiff in error.

Azariah M. Beekman, of Somerville, for the State.

GUMMERE, C. J. The writ of error brings up for review a conviction had against Edward S. Fisher, an attorney at law of this state, upon an indictment charging him with the fraudulent conversion to his own use of the sum of $1,942 of moneys intrusted to him by one Almira H. Staats for the purpose of investing it for her benefit. This money was delivered to the defendant by Mrs. Staats somewhere about the last of November in the year 1919.

The first ground of reversal argued by counsel is directed at the admission of evidence by the trial court, over objection, of the books of the First National Bank of Bound Brook, and also the books of the Bound Brook Trust Company, in each of which banking institutions the defendant at the time of the reception of the moneys carried deposit and checking accounts. The purpose of the introduction of these books was to show that the defendant had not deposited in either of these institutions the moneys intrusted to him by Mrs. Staats. The argument in support of this ground of reversal is that these bank accounts were irrelevant, unless it appeared from them that the particular moneys received from Mrs. Staats had gone into these accounts and were subsequently used by the defendant, contrary to the provisions of the trust under which he received them. We do not think the contention sound. The fact that the moneys were not deposited in either of these banks was some evidence that they were retained by the defendant in his own possession; and although, if tbis was the fact, it would not justify the conclusion, standing alone, of a wrongful appropriation of the moneys, it was, nevertheless, an incident in relation to the defendant's dealing with these moneys which was material, and properly to be considered with other facts proved in the case, in reaching a conclusion whether he was guilty of the crime charged against him in the indictment.

The second ground upon which we are asked to reverse the conviction is that the trial judge erred in refusing to direct a verdict of acquittal for the reason that no proofs had been submitted on the part of the state upon which a verdict of guilty could legally have been found against him. It is enough to say in disposing of this contention that our examination of the proofs sent up with the...