The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-10-05
WRIGHT GOES
TO PRISON
Supreme Court
UphoIds Trial
Court.
Embezzler OF Public
Moneys to Serve
Three Years.
Prisoner Former Chief Clerk of
Public Works Depart
ment.

B. H. Wright, former chief clerk in
the Public Works Department under
H. Boyd, convicted of embezzlement of
public funds in the Circuit Court a
year and a half ago and sentenced to
Imprisonment for three years. had all
| when the Supreme Court filed a
| lengthy opinion in the case, sustain
| ing the verdict of the trial court. All
of Wright's exceptions were overruled
and the case remanded to the Circuit
Court to have the sentence carried out.
The former public officer was imme-
diately asrrested and will shortly at
once begin to serve out his term which
was imposed by Judge De Bolt.
The B. H. Wright case is the first
| one of the public funds embezzlament
matters, in which the defendant has
finally been lodged in prison. James
H. Boyd escaped the penalty on tech
| nicalities and W. H. Wright, the form
er treasurer, is now a fugitive of JUS
tice. To ]. w. Cathcart, former Dapu-
| ty Attorney General is largely due the
conviction of B. H. Wright, as it was
he who conducted the case in the trial
court.
The substance of the decision, which
| is the unanimous opinion of the SUI
preme Court, is as follows:
1.-The defendant was appointed by
| the Superintendent of Public Work rs
chief clerk of the Department of Public
| Works and clerk of the market, his
duties as such clerk being prescribed
| by the Superintendent, amongst them
being the charge of public money re-
ceived at the department, the salary
for his office being appropriated oy the
legislature, but no statute specifically
authorized his appointment or placed
him in charge of public money: held
that the defendant was within the class
of persons designated in section 49,
P. L., viz: Whoever, being a collec-
tor, cashier, clerk or other person en-
ployed in the Government Treas
ury, or in any other department of The
Government, is guilty of embezzlement
of any money, note, or other effects
or property belonging to the Govern
ment.'
Defendants receipt of $3,2S9.53 as
chief clerk of the department OF
Public Works, receipted for by him as
such clerk, his failure on demand to
account for the money, offer to give
his check for it, asking that the matter
be kept quiet, his failure, when asked,
to say what he had done with the
| money, and his concealment of it, not
making any deposit of it in the official
| safe in the office, and failing to pay it
/ into the treasury, constitute in law
the offense of embezzlement as defined
| in Sec. 157, P L.
| THE foregoing acts and conduct of
| the defendant are evidence of his
fraudulent conversion or disposition of
the money to his own use and benefit
or the use and benefit of another than
| the owner or person entitled thereto
under Sec. 157, P. L.
| "A witness for the prosecution testi-
fed that the Acting Superintendent
of Public Works told the defendant
that he suspended him. The objection
made by the defendant to the evidence
that conversations could not be
shown until proof of embezzlement of
some specific sum did not sufficiently
raise the question as to the relevancy
of the evidence of the suspension of
the defendant,
"A stub book of receipts, cash re-
ceipts. and auxiliary cash book kept by
clerks in the Department of Public
Works under the defendants super
vision were admissible in evidence to
show the method of transacting bust
ness in the office and that no entry was
made in those books of the receipts OF
the money alleged to have been en-
bezzled, the audit act of 1898 not re-
curing that the Auditor General es-
tablish a uniform system of keeping
| public accounts, the absence of evil
dence that he had done so does moi
take from these books their character
as public records.
Refusal of the court to allow a wit.
ness to the defendants signature to
receipt for money to be asked on cross
, | examination whether he had com.
pared the writing with other writing.
of defendant held not to be prejudi
cial error, the defendant having sub
| stantia1ly admitted the receipt of tn.
| money"
B. H. Wright's case was the frs
of long and sensational series of EN-
bezzlement cases in the Public Work
| Department and Treasury Depart
ment. He was arrested in August
1902, in the absence of Superintendent
Boyd, who was in San Francisco AM
had left the department in charge o
Treasurer w. H. Wright. The latte
suspended B. H. Wright and took tn