Court Opinion

ID: 9553767
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 19:34:58.022369+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:32:14.887608
License: Public Domain

THE HONORABLE LESTER H. LOBLE, District Judge,
(specially concurring):
In his dissenting opinion MR. JUSTICE BOTTOMLY objects that the true ownership of the stolen business machine is not shown, whereby he dissents that the- information is insufficient to charge a public offense. I do not agree. I concur with MR.
JUSTICE CASTLES.
This prosecution is bottomed on the larceny of $381.60, lawful money of the United States of America, then and there-the property of Steve Fowler and the Comptometer Corporation of Spokane, Washington. The comptometer for which this money was paid was consigned from the Comptometer Corporation of Spokane, Washington, to this company’s distributor, Steve Fowler, in Billings, Montana. It was Steve Fowler’s-function to sell the machine. 'When he sold-the machine, he was required to return a signéd sale order, with any money ré~ *460ceived to this Comptometer Corporation in Spokane, Washington. The sale was there to be processed and the commission due Fowler was to be sent to him. The Comptometer Corporation of Spokane kept the remainder of the money. Remittance arrangement on this kind of machine between branch office in Spokane and home office in Algonquin, Illinois, is not shown.
The defendant Fairburn was employed by the distributor Fowler as his agent and salesman to demonstrate and sell comptometers. Fairburn was required to turn over to Fowler any money by Fairburn received, together with a sale order covering every comptometer as sold.
The allegations of the information as to the true owner were sustained by the proof. In fact, not until the dissenting opinion of MR. JUSTICE BOTTOMLY was the true ownership of the comptometer machine involved in any way or questioned by anyone. There is no specification of error on this ownership. It was not urged on argument in the supreme court, nor is there any evidence in the record to sustain such a contention.
To say that the facts in this case constitute nothing but a civil trespass is startling. Fairburn, knowing full well that as agent he should demonstrate the comptometer, obtain the order and payment and turn the same over to his superior, Steve Fowler, who, in turn, would send it to the Comptometer Corporation of Spokane, Washington, which would remit Fowler’s commission to him at Billings, out of which Fowler would then pay Fairburn his sixteen percent (16%) commission, indulged in this criminal conduct, to-wit:
Fairburn, without knowledge of Steve Fowler, in May at Billings, Montana, sold the machine to the Niagara Cyclo Massage Company of Montana for $381.60 and took a cheek in payment made out to himself under the fictitious name “General Business Machines.” Fowler had never heard of this fictitious corporation. This check was dated June 18, 1957. After endorsing the name “General Business Machines,” Fair-*461bum cashed the check in the Stockmen’s Bar in Billings, and pocketed the money. Never did he tell his superior, Fowler, or anyone else connected with the Comptometer Corporation anything about the sale or the money. If that is not permanently depriving the true owner thereof, what state of facts could ever prove a larceny of this character?
I cannot conceive how the charge, as lodged in the information,. could in any manner mislead or prejudice an accused, and I concur with MR. JUSTICE CASTLES on ample authority, expanding and repeating only his citation of the case of State v. Mjelde, 1904, 29 Mont. 490, 493, 75 Pac. 87, 88:
“Property must have an owner before it is the subject of larceny, but this statute [Sec. 880, Pen. C. 1895, now R.C.M. 1947, sec. 94-2701] does not define the character of that ownership * # * The particular ownership of the property stolen does not fall within the definition, and is not of the essence of the crime. Neither the legal nor moral quality of the act is affected by the fact that the property stolen, instead of being owned by one, or by two or more jointly, is the several property of different owners. The gist of the offense is the felonious taking * * * The grade of the offense is determined by the value of the property taken. The time and place of the taking and the ownership of the thing taken must be alleged in the information, not to give character to the act of taking or appropriation, but merely by way of description. The* fraud is against the owner; but the crime * * * is against the state * * * The prosecution is conducted in the name and by the authority of the state. The owner of the property stolen is not a party thereto.” Emphasis supplied.
MR. JUSTICE BOTTOMLY asks this question, “Did the person intend to permanently deprive the true owner of his property?” A reading of the record answers the question in the same way that the jury answered it. The answer obviously is “Yes.”
The prosecution, the defense and all parties treated the Comptometer Corporation of Spokane and Steve Fowler as the *462true .owner of the- Comptometer- machine and the proceeds of its sale.
The whole-transaction is one of common practice in sales of this character, automobiles, television sets, washing' mai chines, and the like. To treat this as a civil trespass and to require proof of the arrangement between the Comptometer Corporation of Spokane and the Comptometer Corporation'of Algonquin, Illinois, is wholly irrelevant to the inquiry.'Suffice it to say no one ever raised the question of ownership or ever contended that the Comptometer Corporation of Algonquin, Illinois, owned the machine or the proceeds of the sale.
State v. Wallin, 60 Mont. 332, 340, 199 Pac. 285, cited in the dissenting opinion is not in point on any conceivable state of facts in the instant case.