Court Opinion

ID: 9700089
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 21:09:41.719104+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:03.951756
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Justice,
dissenting.
A jury convicted appellee of conspiring with Elmer Johnson, former Chairman of the Board of Commissioners of Schuylkill County, to obtain money from Schuylkill County by fraudulent pretense and, of conspiring with Elmer Johnson to commit a misdemeanor in office by obtaining authorization from Johnson to perform maintenance and repair work at Rest Haven Home and Hospital in violation of the bidding requirements of the County Code.1 The Superior Court reversed the convictions and the majority now affirms, holding the evidence insufficient to support the convictions as a matter of law. I dissent.
When reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain a conviction the test to be applied is “ ‘whether, viewing all of the evidence admitted at trial in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth and drawing all reasonable inferences *396favorable to the Commonwealth, there is sufficient evidence to enable the trier of fact to find every element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.’ ” Commonwealth v. Kichline, 468 Pa. 265, 271, 361 A.2d 282, 285 (1976) (citations omitted). Circumstantial evidence alone is sufficient to support a guilty verdict if the inferences arising from the circumstantial evidence establish guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Commonwealth v. Cox, 460 Pa. 566, 333 A.2d 917 (1975). “[T]he facts and circumstances need not be absolutely incompatible with defendant’s innocence, but the question of any doubt is for the jury unless the evidence ‘be so weak and inconclusive that as a matter of law no probability of fact can be drawn from the combined circumstances.’ ” Commonwealth v. Sullivan, 472 Pa. 129, 149-50, 371 A.2d 468, 478 (1977) (citations omitted).2
Appellee was charged and tried under section 4302 of the Penal Code, Act of June 24, 1939, P.L. 872, § 302, 18 P.S. § 4302, which provided:
“Any two or more persons who falsely and maliciously conspire and agree to cheat and defraud any person of his money, goods, chattels, or other property, or do any other dishonest, malicious, or unlawful act to the prejudice of another, are guilty of conspiracy, a misdemeanor, and on conviction, shall be sentenced to pay a fine not exceeding five hundred ($500), or to undergo imprisonment, by separate or solitary confinement at labor or by simple imprisonment, not exceeding two (2) years, or both.”
Thus, to properly reach verdicts of guilt on each count of conspiracy, the jury must have found beyond a reasonable doubt that appellee entered into an agreement with Elmer Johnson with criminal intent or corrupt motive to do the alleged unlawful acts. The agreement need not be express. Indeed, under the Penal Code, conspiracy may be proved by evidence of conduct by the parties indicating they were acting pursuant to a common design to achieve a common *397end. Commonwealth v. Neff, 407 Pa. 1, 7, 179 A.2d 630 (1962).
Viewed in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, the evidence adduced at trial revealed that appellee was the owner-operator of a construction company. In May of 1969 he was engaged to do repair work on the roof of the Rest Haven Home and Hospital, operated by Schuylkill County. Although appellee’s company was recommended by a Rest Haven employee, Schuylkill County Commissioner Elmer Johnson approved appellee’s employment. Appellee continued to do repair work at Rest Haven on a regular basis until October 1971 when the investigation that resulted in these indictments began. From September 1969 to November 1969, soon after appellee did the initial work at Rest Haven, Johnson hired him to do substantial work on Johnson’s private property. Appellee billed Johnson a total of $7,240. The grand jury’s investigation revealed that $5,600 had not yet been paid on December 21, 1971. That sum was still unpaid at the time of trial in May 1974.
During the period that appellee performed repair services at Rest Haven, he presented the county with 399 separate bills, totalling $283,404.92. Each bill was for $1500 or less. Only the last two bills, which totalled $12,300, were for work done pursuant to written contracts for which bids had been received. The remaining 397 bills were for work which was not done pursuant to contract and for which bids were never taken by the County. On fifty-nine occasions appellee submitted more than one invoice on the same day causing the total amount billed for the day to exceed $1500. On sixty-three separate days, the County issued appellee checks totalling in excess of $1500.
At the request of the County Controller, appellee itemized the bills he submitted to the County. Of the $283,404.92 that appellee billed the County, $224,503 was itemized as labor costs. Reports submitted by appellee to the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry indicate that appellee’s labor costs for the same period were $31,664, the amount appellee actually paid his employees. Forty or fifty *398per cent of this total figure was paid to employees for work at places other than on County property. The invoices appellee submitted for painting the interior and exterior of Rest Haven itemize labor costs at 4420 man hours at $4.00 per hour. The testimony of employees of appellee indicated that they actually worked only 1812 hours on the painting job and were paid only $2.50 per hour. The employees’ testimony reflects the same $2.50 rate of compensation appellee reported to the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry.
The Superintendent of Rest Haven testified that when work was to be done Commissioner Johnson was called and thereafter, in response to the communication appellee would perform the work. The superintendent did not employ appellee and did not know what appellee was hired to do. No one supervised appellee’s performance of the work.
Appellee submitted invoices to the Rest Haven superintendent who checked only the arithmetic. The bills were then sent to the County Controller’s office where again only the arithmetic was checked. Checks were issued and signed by two of the three county commissioners. Chairman Johnson signed many of the checks. The two other county commissioners testified at trial that they were unaware of appellee’s work and of how much he was to be paid.
From this evidence the jury could properly conclude that beyond a reasonable doubt appellee had agreed with Johnson that appellee would submit bills to the County misrepresenting the hours and cost of labor for services performed by appellee for the County, and that Commissioner Johnson would call upon appellee whenever repair work was needed and that the invoices submitted by appellee would be paid by the County without being questioned. The jury could reasonably infer that the agreement to defraud the County by false pretenses arose from Johnson’s delinquent debt to appellee.
The same facts support the finding of an agreement beyond a reasonable doubt in the second conspiracy count. The jury could reasonably conclude beyond a reasonable *399doubt Johnson and appellee agreed that multiple invoices, each less than, but totalling more than $1500, would be submitted on days for which the cost of work performed exceeded $1500, so as to avoid the bidding requirements of the County Code and insure that appellee’s services would be used continually. The fact that many of the work requests were of an emergency nature does not alter this result. The emergency exception to the County Code’s bidding requirements is only operative where by resolution, the County Commissioners declare an emergency exists. No resolutions of emergency were ever passed for any of the work done by appellant. Moreover, many of the jobs done by appellee were work normally associated with regular building maintenance such as painting, and repairing of window screens and sashes.
The evidence was sufficient as a matter of law and the jury could have reasonably found appellee guilty beyond a reasonable doubt on both counts of conspiracy. I would reverse the Superior Court and reinstate the jury’s verdict of guilty on both counts of conspiracy.
LARSEN, J., joins in this dissenting opinion.

. Act of August 9, 1955, P.L. 323, § 101 et seq., as amended, 16 P.S. § 101 et seq. Section 1802 provides that contracts for services in excess of $1500 must be made by advertising for bids. Under section 1803 a commissioner is prohibited from entering into a series of contracts less than $1500 for what is really one transaction.

. See Commonwealth v. Segers, 460 Pa. 149, 157, 331 A.2d 462, 466 (1975); Commonwealth v. Eiland, 450 Pa. 566, 301 A.2d 651 (1973); Commonwealth v. Williams, 450 Pa. 327, 301 A.2d 867 (1973).