State v. Parsons

• Decision Date: 09 November 1906
• Citation: 87 P. 349,44 Wash. 299
• Parties: STATE v. PARSONS et al.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

87 P. 349

44 Wash. 299

STATE v. PARSONS et al.

Supreme Court of Washington

November 9, 1906

Appeal from Superior Court, Chehalis County; Mason Irwin, Judge.

Edward Parsons and Grant Bogan were convicted of robbery, and they appeal.Affirmed.

W. H Abel and E. A. Philbrick, for appellants.

E. E Boner, for the State.

FULLERTON J.

The appellants were convicted on an information charging them with robbery, and appeal from the judgment and sentence pronounced upon them.The acts constituting the offense charged took place at Hoquiam on the morning of February 14 1906, between the hours of 12 and 2 o'clock.The evidence on the part of the state tended to show that the prosecuting witness some time between those hours entered a restaurant at that place and ordered a meal.He had been drinking the night before, and had not as yet fully recovered from its effects.While his meal was being prepared he leaned over the counter at which he was sitting and went to sleep.When the meal was ready he was awakened by the waiter, when he began eating, but seemingly did not become fully awake, and gradually dozed off to sleep again.The appellants came into the room in the meantime, ordered a meal, and, while eating it, jested with the waiter and restaurant cook over the prosecuting witness' condition.After they had finished one of them turned to the cook to settle for their meal, when the other took the witness by the shoulder and aroused him telling him that he must pay for his meal and get out of doors, as that was not a lodging house.The witness then paid for his meal, when the appellant, still holding him by the shoulder, led him out of the door of the restaurant, and there told him that he and his companion were policemen, and were going to take him to jail for being drunk.The other appellant, who had remained talking with the cook until this time, then joined them, and the two took the witness down an alleyway into a saloon, where they told him to sit down.No one was in the saloon at the time except the bartender.After seating the witness in a chair, the appellants approached the bartender and held with him a whispered conversation, whereupon he took some keys from versation, whereupon he took some keys from a hook, and went out into a room a short distance away.While the bartender was out of sight, the appellants again took hold of the witness, raised him up, and told him he must now go to jail, and that it was necessary to search him before going.They thereupon went through his pockets taking from him such money as he had, some $28, and then led him back through the alleyway to the main street where they let him go, telling him to go to a certain saloon, and not let himself be seen on the street until morning.The witness went to his boarding house where he announced that he had been robbed by the night policement of the town.His complaint caused an inquiry to be made which resulted in the arrest of the appellants within a few hours afterwards.The witness testified that he made no resistance or outcry for the reason that he believed the appellants to be policemen, and would 'lick him' if he resisted or made an outcry; that they told him, while searching him, that he must keep still.The prosecuting witness was a Finlander by birth, who had been in the United States less than four years, and spoke the English language brokenly.

The statute(Ballinger's Ann. Codes & St.Supp. § 7103) defines robbery to be the forcible and felonious taking from the person of another, or from his immediate presence, any article of value by violence or putting in fear, and it is contended by the appellants that the evidence here fails to show such use of force and violence, or such putting in fear, in taking the property as is necessary to constitute robbery under the statute.The courts generally hold that it is not robbery to merely snatch from the hand or person of another, or to surreptitiously take from another's pocket, money or some other thing of value, as such taking lacks the element of force, or putting in fear, one or the other of which being essential to constitute the crime of burglary.It is also generally held that where the property is obtained by some artifice or trick intended to, and which does, allay resistance and not arouse fear, such as inducing one to part voluntarily with his money or property under the belief that the taker has a lawful right to it, does not constitute robbery.But, on the other hand, it is generally held whenever the elements of force or putting in fear enters into the taking and is the cause that induces the owner of the property to part with it, the taking is robbery, no matter how slight the act of force or the cause creating the fear may be, nor by what other circumstance the taking may be accompanied.It is enough that the force or the putting in fear employed is sufficient to overcome resistance on the part of the person from whom the property is taken, and is the moving cause inducing him to part unwillingly with his property.

It seems to us that there was in the case before us both the element of force and putting in fear.There was a forcible seizure of the prosecuting witness, his forcible taking to a place where he had no desire to go, a command to keep silent and a forcible taking against his will of his money from his person.True, these acts were accompanied by the false representations to the effect that the appellants were officers of the law having...