Case ID: ny-crim_29/html/0201-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Woodward, J.:", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

SUPREME COURT — APP. DIVISION-SECOND DEPARTMENT,
    February 7, 1913.
    PEOPLE v. JOHN WINSTON.
    (155 App. Div. 907.)
    Motob vehicles — Information fob violation of speed regulations.
    An information which fails to charge that defendant operated a. motor vehicle at a speed in excess of thirty miles an hour, for a distance of one-fourth of a mile, charges no crime under the Motor Vehicle Law, so-called.
    Appeal by the defendant from an order of the County Court of Westchester county, entered in the office of the clerk of said county on the 1st day of February, 1911, affirming a judgment of conviction for violation of section 287 of the Highway Law (Consol. Laws, chap. 25; Laws of 1909, chap. 30), as added by chapter 374 of the Laws of 1910, after a trial in the Mount Vernon Court of Special Sessions.
   Woodward, J.:

The defendant was charged by an information with having “ wilfully, knowingly and unlawfully ” operated a motor vehicle, an automobile, “ at a greater rate of speed than thirty miles an hour on said highway in violation of and contrary to section 287, chapter 374 of Laws of 1910, constituting chapter 25 of the Consolidated Laws of New York as amended.” There is no charge that the defendant operated his automobile at a speed in excess of thirty miles an hour for a distance of one-fourth of a mile, and in the absence of such an allegation no crime is charged. Nor does the proof establish that the defendant in fact drove the car a distance of one-fourth of a mile in excess of thirty miles an hour. There was no violation of the statute, so far as the information or the testimony discloses, and it was error to hold that the conviction of the Court of Special Sessions was lawful.

The judgment of the County Court of Westchester county should be reversed, and the fine paid by the defendant should be remitted.

Jenks, P. J., Hirschberg, Burr and Rich, JJ., concurred.

Judgment of the County Court of Westchester county reYersed and fine paid by defendant remitted..