State v. Wagner
| Decision Date | 16 January 1956 |
| Docket Number | No. 42596,42596 |
| Parties | STATE of Louisiana v. George WAGNER. |
| Court | Louisiana Supreme Court |
Matthew S. Braniff, New Orleans, for defendant-appellant.
Fred S. LeBlanc, Atty. Gen., M. E. Culligan, Asst. Atty. Gen., Leon D. Hubert, Jr., Dist. Atty., Phil Trice, Asst. Dist. Atty., New Orleans, for appellee.
The defendant was convicted of the crime of administering dilaudid, a narcotic drug, in violation of LSA-R.S. 40:962 and sentenced to serve ten years in the State Penitentiary. He has appealed.
During the course of the trial, counsel for the defendant reserved ten bills of exception to the rulings of the trial judge. Bills of Exception Nos. 4, 7, and 10 have been abandoned.
Bills of Exception Nos. 1, 3, 5, and 6 involve the same legal question, viz.: the admissibility of evidence to prove that the defendant together with others burglarized a doctor's bag containing dilaudid tablets some six days prior to the commission of the alleged offense.
The defendant was charged in a bill of information with the administering of a narcotic drug, to-wit: dilaudid, to three named persons under the age of seventeen years. The defendant and others burglarized the automobile of Dr. Warren Schulingkamp on February 24, 1954, while the car was in the parking lot of the Baptist Hospital and took the physician's bag containing, among other things, a small bottle of dilaudid tablets. They left the scene and drove directly to the defendant's dance studio several blocks away where the physician's bag was examined and the contents taken therefrom. On March 2, 1954, the defendant and his same companions met at the dance studio and engaged in a narcotic binge using the dilaudid tablets taken from the doctor's bag. The dilaudid tablets were produced by the defendant and prepared for injection. The dilaudid solution was injected into the arms of the persons present. The State's witnesses to whom the drug had been administered had never used dilaudid before or since and were unable to tell whether they had received injections of that particular drug, or some other drug, or a derivative thereof. In order to identify this drug and its exact nature, it was necessary to trace the possession of the drug to some qualified person who could identify it. The last person who had possession of the narcotic before it came into the hands of the accused was Dr. Schulingkamp and it was essential to prove that the drug was that which belonged to the doctor and was in fact dilaudid. When the accused was arrested, he admitted the theft of the dilaudid from Dr. Schulingkamp's automobile.
The defendant would necessarily have to have possession of the drug in order to administer it and, as pointed out in the case of State v. Montgomery, 170 La. 203, 207, 127 So. 601, 602, 'Whenever the evidence of the commission of another crime, other than the crime for which the defendant is on trial, is relevant to the question of his guilt or innocence of the crime charged, the evidence of the commission of the other crime should not be excluded merely because of its prejudicial effect.' Under the provisions of Arts. 445 and 446, now LSA-Revised Statutes 15:445 and 15:446 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, evidence is admissible to show guilty knowledge. In ...
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State v. Dotson
... ... Although the prior conduct was criminal, it had an independent relevance to guilty knowledge, an essential element of the crime charged. LSA-R.S. 15:445, 446; State v. Harris, 232 La. 911, 95 So.2d 496; State v. Wagner, 229 La. 223, 85 So.2d 272; Comment, Admissibility of [260 La. 519] Evidence of Prior Arrests in Louisiana Criminal Trials, 19 La.L.Rev. 684, 690. On the issue of guilty knowledge or intent, the defendant denied prior use of marijuana. Hence, the State had the right to contradict this testimony ... ...
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State v. Pailet
... ... See, among other authorities, State v. Rives, 193 La. 186, 190 So. 374; State v. Johnson, 228 La. 317, 82 So.2d 24 (on rehearing); State v. Wagner, 229 La. 223, 85 So.2d 272; State v. Blankenship, 231 La. 993, 93 So.2d 533 and State v. Allen, 243 La. 698, 146 So.2d 407 ... [246 La. 502] While there are no Louisiana cases relative to the admissibility of proof of similar acts by an accused on trial for abortion, the text ... ...
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State v. Cryer
... ... We have previously held that for this offense the age of the defendant need not be alleged in the bill of information nor established by evidence before the jury. See State v. Kaufman, 234 La. 673, 101 So.2d 197 (1958); State v. Wagner, 229 La. 223, 85 So.2d 272 (1956) ... Taking note of these decisions, the defendants contend that they should be overruled. We disagree. As we observed in [262 La. 584] State v. Kaufman, the defendant's age in LSA-R.S. 40:981 is not an essential element of the offense. It ... ...
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28,152 La.App. 2 Cir. 5/8/96, State v. Baker
...the absence of a prescription. The Code authorizes the court to disregard surplusage in the bill. La.C.Cr.P. art. 486; State v. Wagner, 229 La. 223, 85 So.2d 272 (1956). The quoted passage is obviously an unnecessary effort to negate the "lawful order" exception of R.S. 40:973B(3). 6 La.C.C......