Court Opinion

ID: 9828518
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 18:27:29.847816+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:49.997213
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
Appellant has filed a vigorous motion for rehearing, in which he takes issue with the holding of this court in the original opinion, and, though we have carefully considered said motion, we believe our former opinion was correct, and that we must adhere to the conclusion therein reached.
Appellant urges that Williams v. State, 86 Tex. Cr. R. 640, 218 S. W. 750, by the Court of Criminal Appeals of this state, is in point and contrary to our original conclusions, and he urges that the opinion of that court ought to, have great weight. We agree that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals is a court of final jurisdiction in criminal eases, and that the judges thereof, past and present, have been able lawyers and jurists. In passing it may be said, to remove any thought held by the counsel for appellant that we do not give the opinion of that court due weight, that one of the present justices of that court is a brother-in-law of the writer, and we agree that he and his associates are able lawyers.
But we did not think this case, cited by appellant in his brief, was pertinent to the decision of the questions presented in the instant ease. In Williams v. State, supra, the court merely decided that a duplicate deposit slip could be the subject of forgery, citing the case of State v. Jackson, by Supreme Court of Missouri, 221 Mo. 478, 120 S. W. 70, 133 Am. St. Rep. 477. That case was as to duplicate deposit slips, purporting to be signed by the cashier of the bank. By our penal statute, forgery is defined as follows :
“He is guilty of forgery who, without lawful authority, and with intent to injure or defraud, shall make a false instrument in writing, purporting to be the act of another, in such manner that the false instrument so made would (if the same were true) have created, increased, diminished, discharged or defeated any pecuniary obligation, or would have transferred, or in any manner have affected any property whatever.” Penal Code, art. 924.
“ ‘Pecuniary obligation’ means every instrument having money for its object, and every obligation for the breach of which a civil action for damages may be lawfully brought.” Penal Code, art. 930.
Article 5688, Rev. Civil Statutes, subd. 1, is as follows:
“There shall be Commenced and prosecuted within four years after the cause of action shall have accrued, and not afterward, all actions or suits in court of the following description: 1. Actions for debt where the indebtedness is evidenced by or founded upon any contract in writing.”
We are of the opinion that the notation in the passbook, as pleaded in the instant case, especially since it was not alleged that it was signed by anybody authorized *1099by tbe bank so to do, is not a Contract in writng binding tbe bank to pay to tbe depositor tbe amount so mentioned. 3 R. C. L. p. 531, § 160.
Tbe motion for rebearing is overruled.