State v. Litman
| Decision Date | 28 June 1927 |
| Citation | 138 A. 132,106 Conn. 345 |
| Court | Connecticut Supreme Court |
| Parties | STATE v. LITMAN ET AL. |
Appeal from Superior Court, Fairfield County; Newell Jennings Judge.
Jack Litman and others were convicted of assault with intent to kill and murder, under an information in four counts by the state's attorney charged by defendants jointly with assault with intent to kill and murder Ulrich Pozzuolo and Enrico Pozzuolo, and with assault with dangerous and deadly weapons on the same parties, tried to the jury and they appeal. No error.
Josiah H. Peck and Thomas J. Spellacy, both of Hartford, for appellants.
William H. Comley, State's Atty., and E. Earle Garlick, Asst State's Atty., both of Bridgeport, for the State.
Argued before WHEELER, C.J., and MALTBIE, HAINES, HINMAN, and BANKS JJ.
This appeal is based upon the denial of the defendants' motion to set aside the verdicts of guilty, the refusal of the trial court to charge as requested by the defendants, and upon exceptions to a certain portion of the charge as made.
The first reason of appeal requires us to determine whether, upon all the evidence before it, the jury could reasonably have reached the conclusion that these defendants were guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of an assault with intent to kill and murder.
A study of all the evidence satisfies us that the jury would have been justified in finding the following facts established beyond a reasonable doubt: That on September 24, 1926, two brothers, Enrico and Ulrich Pozzuolo, made their home at the Ambassador Arms, an apartment house in Stamford in this state, and were employed in an establishment in Stamford, owned by one Mrs. McMahon, with about 75 employees, in the manufacture of dress goods. Enrico, the elder of the two brothers, held an important position at the factory as a designer, being paid $100 per week, and Ulrich was his assistant, both having entered the employment in June, 1926. The proprietor of the factory had for a considerable period before September 24, 1926, employed a taxicab driver named Ferguson to call for the brothers at the Ambassader Arms each morning about 8 o'clock and convey them to their employment at the factory and return them to their apartment at the end of the day. The proprietor also provided two factory guards, Winter and Pfeiffer, to accompany the two brothers to and from their work. It also appeared in evidence without objection that about a month prior to September 24th, a Flint automobile with a New York license number 9Y9819 and containing five men was seen waiting in front of the factory at the close of the day's business. Two of these men were the accused, Blum and Rosenberg. When the Pozzuolo brothers left for home in the taxicab on this day, they were immediately followed by the five men in the Flint car. Later the same day the police of Stamford arrested Blum and Rosenberg and a third man named Ober, and examined the Flint car, in which they found two sawed-off billiard cues, each of which was rolled in newspapers. On the morning of September 24, 1926, the taxicab was waiting at the curb with the guards in front of the Ambassador Arms to take the Pozzuolo brothers to the factory. As they came from their apartment onto the sidewalk about 8 o'clock, nine men rushed upon them attacking them with sawed-off billiard cues which were rolled in newspapers. The brothers were able to get into the taxicab, where the assault was continued, the windows of the cab being smashed by the attackers; the elder of the brothers rushed from the cab and was struck to the pavement and beaten. In the commotion which resulted from the attack these nine men threw away their weapons and ran to two waiting automobiles on the opposite side of the street and escaped in them. Blum and Kakye were recognized in court by an eyewitness of the assault as two of the nine men who thus escaped. The affair was at once reported by this eyewitness to the police, together with the New York number of one of the two cars used by the nine men, 9C8282. This witness then returned to the scene of the assault and picked up from the street five sawed-off billiard cues, four of which were rolled in newspapers, and also a piece of iron pipe which was found on the lawn in front of the Ambassador. Two of the weapons picked up, which were rolled in newspapers, had fresh red stains on the paper. A few minutes after 8 a Flint car bearing the New York license number 9Y9819 and containing five men was seen going rapidly toward New York City, and was followed by the police in another car, overtaken and stopped as it was going into Greenwich. The men in the car were covered by the revolvers of the police and arrested and taken to headquarters, where they gave their names as Harris, Corti, Rosenberg, Baer and Blum, and identified in court as five of the accused. Two iron jimmies were found in this Flint car. This was the same Flint car which had followed the Pozzuolos a month previous and from which two sawed-off billiard cues wrapped in newspapers were taken by the police, after arresting Blum and Rosenberg, two of the five men in the car. Upon telephone request from the Stamford police, the police of Greenwich intercepted another car a few minutes afterward bearing the New York number 9C8282 and arrested the four men who were in it, who gave their names as Kakye, Cavus, Tittlebaum, and Litman, and were identified as the other four of these nine defendants. A piece of iron pipe and a 32-caliber cartridge with a steel-jacketed bullet were found in that car by the police. When these four men were arrested, one was heard to say to the others, " Keep your mouth shut," and one of the accused, Litman, had what an officer believed to be a blood stain upon the sleeve of his coat. Both the Pozzuolos were injured, the elder, the more seriously, and both required some days of hospital treatment. Afterward they disappeared and have not since been located. The two guards and the driver, Ferguson, also disappeared. The defendants offered no testimony at the trial except the court record of one of the state's witnesses.
In behalf of the defendants it is contended that the state failed to establish their identity beyond a reasonable doubt. An eyewitness testified there were nine men involved in the assault, who escaped in two automobiles. Two of the men he identified as Blum and Kakye, and one of the cars was a Buick, No. 9C8282. The men who were in this car when arrested soon afterward, driving rapidly toward New York, were identified as Kakye, Cavus, Tittlebaum, and Litman. Kakye and this particular car were thus directly involved in the assault, and it was this car that he was in when arrested, obviously fleeing from the scene of the assault.
The Flint car No. 9Y9819 was used by Blum and Rosenberg in following the Pozzuolo brothers from the factory to their apartments, some time before. It is sufficiently obvious that this car was also being used to make an escape, and when stopped it was found to contain Harris, Corti, Baer, Blum, and Rosenberg. Blum and Rosenberg are thus shown to have used this car on both occasions, and Blum was shown to have been one of the nine men fleeing after the assault. Identity is further aided by the finding in both cars of weapons of the same sort as those used in the assault, some of them, the sawed-off billiard cues, having been obviously specially prepared, as were some of those used in the assault.
We are entirely satisfied upon the facts above summarized and other circumstances before the jury that they were justified in holding that the identity of these nine men had been established beyond a reasonable doubt. It is true that evidence was offered that one of the state's witnesses whose testimony aided the identification had at one time served a term of imprisonment for embezzlement. While this was a proper attack upon his credibility, the jury were nevertheless at liberty to credit his statements in the present case, as they apparently did. Indeed, it so dovetails into the circumstances otherwise established that we...
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...v. Holley, [174 Conn. 22, 26, 381 A.2d 539 (1977) ] State v. Bzdyra, 165 Conn. 400, 404-405, 334 A.2d 917 (1973); State v. Litman, 106 Conn. 345, 352-53, 138 A. 132 (1927). These inferences are necessary because the direct evidence of the accused's state of mind is rarely available. See Sta......
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