Court Opinion

ID: 9864682
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 14:56:33.716632+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:24:01.378211
License: Public Domain

THE COURT.
The petitionfor a rehearing is denied. The petitioner is in error in assuming that the cause was reversed upon a conflict of evidence. The reason for the reversal was that the court was satisfied that from a review of the entire record the defendant had not been accorded a fair trial before the jury. As the cause was to go back -for a new trial we discussed the evidence at some length merely for the purpose of pointing out some of the well-settled rules of law covering the elements of the crime which must be proved. As the Penal Code provides that an appropriation made openly and avowedly and under a claim in good faith is a sufficient defense to a charge of embezzlement, this was the real issue which the defendant *44brought before the jury. The evidence was without conflict that the appropriation was made openly and avowedly and under an adverse claim. The question of good faith in the claim was clearly one for the jury to determine. It was because of the misconduct on the part of the prosecution that the defendant was prejudiced on the presentation of this issue. If we were in error in our statement of the evidence this was due to the failure of the state to point to the portions of the typewritten record which were claimed to support the statement of facts made in the brief. If we had reversed the judgment upon the ground that the evidence was insufficient to support it, then the matter of a conflict in the evidence would become an important factor. But this is not important when the evidence is merely referred to for other purposes.
A petition by respondent to have the cause heard in the supreme court, after judgment in the district court of appeal, was denied by the supreme court on May 5, 1926.