Williams v. West Chicago St. R. Co.

• Decision Date: 24 October 1901
• Citation: 191 Ill. 610,61 N.E. 456
• Parties: WILLIAMS v. WEST CHICAGO ST. R. CO.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

191 Ill. 610

61 N.E. 456

WILLIAMS

v.WEST CHICAGO ST. R. CO.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Oct. 24, 1901.

Appeal from appellate court, First district.

Action by James Williams against the West Chicago Street Railroad Company. From a judgment of the appellate court (94 Ill. App. 385) affirming a judgment in favor of defendant, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Pease & Polkey, for appellant.

John A. Rose and Louis Boisot (W. W. Gurley, of counsel), for appellee.

HAND, J.

This is an action of assumpsit brought by the appellant against the appellee in the circuit court of Cook county to recover a reward offered by the appellee for the arrest and conviction of the murderer or murderers of C. B. Birch, who was killed while in the service of the appellee, which, as published, was in the following terms: ‘$5,000 Reward. Office West Chicago Street Railroad Co., June 24, 1895. The above reward will be paid by the West Chicago Street Railroad Company for the arrest and conviction of the murderer or murderers of C. B. Birch, who was fatally shot, while in discharge of his duty as receiver, on the morning of June 23, at the Armitage avenue barn. Charles T. Yerkes, Pres't.’ At the close of all the evidence the court directed the jury to find the issues for the defendant, which was accordingly done; and a judgment having been rendered on said verdict, which judgment has been affirmed by the appellate court for the First district, a further appeal has been prosecuted to this court.

At about 2 o'clock on Sunday morning, June 23, 1895, Birch, whose duty it was to receive the money brought in by the conductors, was fatally shot at the barn of appellee located at Armitage avenue, in the city of Chicago. The appellant, who was also an employé of the appellee, and whose duty consisted of going from barn to barn each night to inspect the cash registers, was in the barn from midnight until 2 o'clock in the morning, and left just before the killing of Birch. As he drove away in his buggy he noticed two men coming across the street towards the barn. They looked sharply at him, and he looked at them. On Monday morning, June 24th, the appellant went to the appellee's office, where he met its general superintendent, who inquired of him if he saw any men near the barn as he drove away. Appellant told him that he had seen two men, and that he thought he could identify them, whereupon the superintendent gave him a note, and told him to go and see Capt. Larson, of the police force. He called upon Capt. Larson that afternoon, told him what he had seen, and gave him a description of the two men, whereupon the officer said that he had a man in custody at that time who he thought answered the description of one of the men described by him. The man, whose name was Julius Mannow, was brought up, and was identified by the appellant as one of the men he had seen near the barn as he drove away. Capt. Larson told him to come to the station the next day, and in the meantime he would hunt up and have arrested the other man he had described. The murder of Birch led the police authorities to at once issue what was termed a ‘dragnet order;’ that is, an order to the various patrolmen to arrest all suspicious characters in their respective districts, and bring them in for examination as to their whereabouts at the time of the commission of the crime. Mannow was thus arrested and brought to the station. A police officer named Jurs testified upon the trial of this cause that, about two months before the time of the murder, Mannow had narrated to him a plan for the robbing of a coal office in the manner in which the Armitage avenue robbery was accomplished, and had described Joseph Windrath as concerned in the plan, and that after the Armitage avenue robbery and the murder of Birch the witness at once recalled this fact, and suspected Mannow and Windrath, and took steps to cause their arrest. This was before the information was given by the appellant. On Tuesday morning, the 25th day of June, the appellant for the first time learned of the offered reward, by reading the same as published in the Chicago Tribune. Afterwards, on that day, he went again to the police station and identified Windrath, who had been arrested in the meantime, as the man he had seen in company with Mannow near the barn just before the killing. The services rendered by the appellant in connection with the arrest and conviction of Mannow and Windrath after he knew of the offered reward consisted in his identification of Windrath, and his testifying before the coroner's jury, the grand jury, and upon the trial in the criminal court that he had seen Mannow and Windrath together near the Armitage avenue barn on the night and near the time of the commission of the crime. Other information was obtained by the police authorities shortly after the identification of Mannow and Windrath which fastened the crime upon the two men. Mannow pleaded guilty, and Windrath was tried and convicted. The offered reward was paid by the appellee to another claimant.

The offer of a reward remains conditional until it is accepted by the performance of the service, and one who offers a reward has the right to prescribe whatever terms he may see fit, and such terms must be substantially complied with before any contract arises between him and the claimant. Thus, if the reward is offered for the arrest and conviction of a criminal, or for his arrest and the recovery of the money stolen, both the arrest and conviction or arrest and recovery of the money are conditions precedent to the recovery of the reward; and, when the offer is for the delivery of a fugitive at a certain place, the reward cannot be earned by the delivery of him at another place, and an offer for a capture of two is not acted upon by the capture of one. The reward cannot be apportioned. The offer is an entirety, and as such must be enforced, or not at all. 21 Am. & Eng. Enc. Law (1st Ed.) 391-397; Hogan v. Stophlet, 179 Ill. 150, 53 N. E. 604,44 L. R. A. 809; Furman v. Parke, 21 N. J. Law, 310; Fitch v. Snedaker, 38 N. Y. 248, 97 Am. Dec. 791;Juniata Co. v. McDonald, 122 Pa. 115, 15 Atl. 696;Shuey v. U. S., 92 U. S. 73, 23 L. Ed. 697. In Hogan v. Stophlet, supra, which was an action for the recovery of a reward offered for the ‘apprehension and conviction of a criminal,’ this court said (page 153, 179 Ill., page 605, 53 N. E., and page 810, 44 L. R. A.): ‘The reward was offered for the apprehension and conviction of the person or persons who burned or caused the building to be burned. It thus appears that the reward was offered, not for the conviction alone, but for the apprehension and conviction of the guilty party. Appellant is entitled to recover for both, or he cannot recover at all. The reward cannot be apportioned; that is to say, there can be no apportionment of it between what is due for the apprehension and what is due for the conviction. The offer must be enforced as an entirety, or not at all.’ In Furman v. Parke, supra, the reward was ‘for the apprehension and conviction of such person or persons as may have been implicated in the murder of John B. Parke, John Castner, Maria Castner, and child.’ The court say: ‘The reward is to be paid for the apprehension and conviction, not of one of several persons implicated, but of the person (if...