State v. Wilson

• Citation: 127 P. 980,63 Or. 344
• Parties: STATE v. WILSON.
• Decision Date: 26 November 1912
• Court: Supreme Court of Oregon

127 P. 980

63 Or. 344

STATE v. WILSON.

Supreme Court of Oregon

November 26, 1912

Appeal from Circuit Court, Union County; J.W. Knowles, Judge.

W.J Wilson was convicted of larceny, and he appeals. Affirmed.

The defendant was brought to trial in the circuit court upon an indictment, the charging part of which is as follows "The said W.J. Wilson, on the 6th day of February, 1912 in the county of Union, and the state of Oregon, did then and there unlawfully and feloniously take, steal, and carry away in an office, to wit, the office of the Oregon-Washington Railroad & Navigation Company, a private corporation, at Union Station, said Union county, the following described personal property, then and there the subject of larceny, and kept in said office, to wit, one railroad passenger ticket printed, issued, and signed by the Oregon-Washington Railroad & Navigation Company, a private corporation, as evidence of the right of a passenger to transportation on the railroad of said company, from Union, Or., to Portland, Or.; said passenger ticket being then and there signed by the printed fac simile signature of Wm. McMurray, general passenger agent of said company, and then and there bearing and having printed thereon the number 3066, and then and there the only railroad passenger ticket of said description and number in said office. That said railroad passenger ticket was then and there the personal property of the Oregon-Washington Railroad & Navigation Company, a private corporation, and then and there evidence of the right of a passenger to transportation upon the railroad of said company, between the said points of Union, Or., and Portland, Or., and then and there of the value of $9.40." A general demurrer to this indictment having been overruled, the defendant entered a plea of not guilty, and the resulting trial terminated in the conviction and sentence, from which the defendant appeals.

R.J Green, of La Grande, for appellant.

F.S. Ivanhoe, of La Grande (A.M. Crawford, of Salem, on the brief), for the State.

BURNETT J. (after stating the facts as above).

The theory of the prosecution, in support of which there was considerable testimony, is to the effect that the defendant was a telegraph operator who had been in the employ of the company at Union, Or., and had been discharged. Afterwards, however, he gained access to the tickets on sale to passengers, and without the knowledge or consent of the agent in charge at that point abstracted the ticket in question and another from the rack where they were kept and, taking the stamp used for that purpose, postdated it and stamped the ticket on the back. In fact, he admitted in his own testimony that he did so stamp the ticket. Soon afterwards he was apprehended in Baker, where he was trying to sell it. The contention of the defendant is that, in order to sustain a conviction for larceny of a railroad ticket within the meaning of section 1947, L. O.L., the state must prove that the ticket when taken was a genuine effective railroad passenger ticket entitling the bearer or some one to passage on the road; that, inasmuch as the testimony disclosed that the selling agent was required to stamp the date of sale on the back of the ticket when selling it in the regular course of business, a ticket not so stamped, or stamped without authority, was not a ticket within the meaning of the statute noted above. This is the sole question raised by the defendant on this appeal. An excerpt from the statute referred to reads thus: "If any person shall steal any goods or chattels or any government note, bank note, promissory note, bill of exchange, bond or other thing in action, *** or any railroad, railway, steamboat or steamship passenger ticket or other evidence of the right of a passenger to transportation which is the property of another, such person shall be deemed guilty of larceny. ***"

It may be conceded that, as a railroad ticket is merely a conventional representative of value, it is not the subject of larceny at common law, but our statute has included many things in the category of that crime which were not regarded as such in the system of jurisprudence from which our laws are derived. The question is reduced to this Whether or not a ticket kept in its office by the railroad company for sale to those who thereafter propose to become passengers over its road is a railroad ticket within the meaning of the statute. The law does not require that the ticket shall be stamped with a date or any other mark before being used. The dating of the ticket depends upon a private regulation prescribed by the...