State v. Rucker

• Decision Date: 14 November 1887
• Citation: 5 S.W. 609,93 Mo. 88
• Parties: STATE v. RUCKER.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

5 S.W. 609

93 Mo. 88

STATE v. RUCKER.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

November 14, 1887.

1. FORGERY — INDICTMENT — INTENT TO DEFRAUD SPECIFIC PERSON.

Rev. St. Mo. § 1686, provides that in an indictment for an offense, when an intent to cheat or defraud shall be necessary to constitute the offense, it shall be sufficient to allege that the defendant did the act with intent to defraud, without alleging the intent to defraud any particular person. An indictment for forgery charged the offense in the language of the statutes, set forth the instrument, and alleged an "intent to defraud against the peace and dignity of the state." Held, that the indictment was sufficient.

2. SAME — EVIDENCE.

In a trial for forgery, it was proved by the person whose name was signed to the check that it was a forgery; also that defendant presented the check in payment for goods, and obtained a balance in money for it, and that defendant had been seen with the check. Defendant testified that he never saw the check until arrested, and that he could not read or write. Held, that a demurrer to the evidence by defendant was properly overruled.

3. SAME — AIDING AND ABETTING FORGERY — INSTRUCTIONS.

An instruction by the court, on a trial for forgery, that, in order to find defendant guilty, they must find without a reasonable doubt that he forged the check himself, or procured it to be forged, or was present aiding in the forgery, held correct.

4. SAME.

An instruction that the jury must acquit the defendant of the crime of forgery, unless they found that he forged the check, but ignoring the principle that he was alike guilty if he aided or abetted some one else in committing the forgery, held properly refused.

Appeal from circuit court, Saline county; JOHN D. RYLAND, Judge.

The Attorney General, for respondent. J. F. King, for appellant.

BRACE, J.

The defendant was indicted, tried, and convicted of the crime of forgery in the second degree; his motion in arrest of judgment and for a new trial was overruled, and he brings the case here by appeal. The indictment, omitting the formal part, is as follows: "That Henry Rucker, on the twentieth day of August, 1886, at the county of Saline aforesaid, feloniously did forge, counterfeit, and falsely make a certain false, forged, and counterfeit check, purporting to be made and drawn by one C. C. Booth, on the Farmers' Savings Bank, a bank then and there duly incorporated under the laws of the state of Missouri, which said false, forged, and counterfeit check is of the tenor following, that is to say:

                "`No. ____.                                  MARSHALL, Mo., Aug. 20, 1886
                 "`Farmers' Savings Bank, pay to Henry Taylor, or bearer, five dollars ($5.)
                "`$5.                                                       C. C. BOOTH.'
                

— With intent thereby then and there to feloniously injure and defraud against the peace and dignity of the state."

The indictment is sufficient. It charges the offense in the language of the statute, sets forth the instrument according to its tenor, and it was not necessary to its validity to charge that there was an intent on the part of the defendant to defraud any particular person. Rev. St. 1879, § 1686. The verdict was in proper form, and there was no error in overruling the motion in arrest of judgment. The causes assigned...