Court Opinion

ID: 9653844
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 17:56:53.713642+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:02.561243
License: Public Domain

WALKER, Circuit Judge '
(dissenting), '
I am nable to concur in conclusions stated in the foregoimg opinion. There was the foregoing opinion There was evxdence tending to prove that the appellant Mc-Danl®1’ actm? £or a corporation °f which he "as tbe onager, in selling for that corporatlon appeUante Young and Coates large pities of sugar, com chops, p;e pain, fruifs 3™» and cbarr?d bafels> and f trans’ P°rtmg pnd dejivering those articles fre^ently ^ the nighttime, and the appellants Joung and Coate m buying and selling tbose things, acted in concert between themsal!e® and otber appellants for the purpose o£bnngfg about or f aeihtatmgviolations by cha^®d °£ tbe National Prohibition Aet by unlawfully manufacturing, possess- . “d transporting intoxicating liquor. Jbe mdlet“fnt and the evidence showed more £ban concerted action between the sellers and ^m ™lawfulftes- “ that they showed ***** *b! seIlef aüd acted m eof'f with others charged, for the purpose of ex- » ,, , & o, ^ fectmg the unlawful manufacture, posses- • , , ... « . , . ’ . sion, and transportation of intoxicating liquor '
Though such sales in which the applelant McDaniel paticipated and such purchases and sales by appellants Young and Coates , . 1-, , were not in themselves illegal, they were rendered illegal if such pats of a scheme participated in by those thre0 ns and otherg aeeuged to bring. about the unlawful manufaeture, possession, gaJ and transportation of intoxicating liq.uor Tboge things may have been rendered unlawful by the plan or concerted purpose in pursuance of which they were done. They were capable of being designed or done for an unlawful purpose. Danovitz v. United States, 281 U. S. 389, 50 S. Ct. 344, 74 L. Ed. 923. An act, harmless when done by one, may become a public wrong when done by many, acting in concert for an unlawful purpose. Grenada Lumber Co. v. Mississippi, 217 U. S. 433, 30 S. Ct. 535, 54 L. Ed. 826; Bedford, etc., Co. v. Stone Cutters Ass’n, 274 U. S. 37, 54, 47 S. Ct. 522, 71 L. Ed. 916, 54 A. L. R. 791. “No conduct has such an absolute privilege as to justify all possible schemes of which it may be a part. The most *28innocent and constitutionally protected of acts or omissions may be made a step in a criminal plot, and if it is a step in a plot, neither its innocence nor the Constitution is suffieient to prevent tbe punishment of the plot by law.” Aikens v. Wisconsin, 195 U. S. 194, 206, 25 S. Ct. 3, 6, 49 L. Ed. 154. The above-mentioned acts, as evidence adduced tended to prove, being bound together as parts of a plan or concerted scheme to bring about or facilitate violations of the National Prohibition Act (27 USCA), are tainted with the criminality of that plan. Swift & Co. v. United States, 196 U. S. 375, 396, 25 S. Ct. 2,76, 49 L. Ed. 518; Badders v. United States, 240 U. S. 391, 394, 36 S. Ct. 367, 60 L. Ed. 706. The conspiring which evidence tended to prove being directed to violations of the National Prohibition Act, everything done in pursuance of it was illegal, and all participants in the plot or scheme were guilty as conspirators. Ford v. United States, 273 U. S. 593, 620, 47 S. Ct. 531, 71 L. Ed. 793.
The decision in the case of Edenfield v. United States, 273 U. S. 660, 47 S. Ct. 345, 71 L. Ed. 827, had the effeet of affirming a conviction under counts of an indictment , • , , making charges similar to the charge made by the indictment in the instant ease, which charges were supported by evidence which, in my opinion, had no more tendency to support a charge made than the evidence in the instant ease. In that case a reversal was unsuecessfully sought because of the action of the trial court in giving an instruction to the jury to the effeet that, if Edenfield knew that the copper, sugar, meal, ami bran he furnished, in the quantities he furnished, were not usable, so far as he knew, except in the manufacture of liquor or the making of stills, and if he furnished those things with the knowledge that they were to be used for such purposes, then it was for the jury to determine as to whether, when he furnished those things to other persons accused, then knowing that those persons were going to use them in man-ufaeturing the liquor, that would constitute an agreement between him and those persons to violate the law against manufacturing liquor. It seems to me that the decision evidenced by the foregoing opinion is ineonsistent with that part of the decision in the case of Edenfield v. United States, supra, which had the effeet of affirming the conviction under counts of the indictment under which the accused was tried. The opinion in the ease of United States v. Katz, 271 U. S. 354, 46 S. Ct. 513, 70 L. Ed. 986, indicates that a charge of criminal conspiracy cannot properly be based on an agreement between the seller and buyer in a sale made for a criminal purpose, because such an agreement is an essential element of tbe sale itself, and the sale could not make a party to it guilty of a crime other than the one committed by the seller; but that opinion also indicates that the buyer and seller of things used in manufacturing intoxicating liquor properly could be charged with conspiring with others to bring about the unlawful manufacture of such, liquor by using those things, as the substantive offense conspired to be committed has an ingredient in addition to the sale, not requiring the agreement of two persons for its completion. A party to an agreement to bring about the commission of a crime is subject to be charged with criminally conspiring with others, though he was to do nothing in 'furtheranee of the agreement except to sell a thing intended to be used by another in committing the crime which was the object of the agreement.