Court Opinion

ID: 9587963
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:28:27.888222+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:00:56.575856
License: Public Domain

Stolz, Judge.
The appellant appeals from his conviction of theft by taking.
The appellant owned a White Freightliner — the tractor portion of a tractor-trailer truck. There was an undertaking by the appellant to sell that vehicle to Mr. McClure, but McClure did not make the proper payments and the sale was never consummated. The truck was, *796however, entrusted to McClure’s custody pending the closing of the deal. On September 24,1974, the appellant’s tractor was connected to a trailer owned by Mr. Buice, whose family had very close business connections with McClure.
As McClure failed to pay the defendant for the tractor as promised the defendant decided to repossess his vehicle. During the early morning hours of September 14, 1974, defendant removed his tractor which had Buice’s trailer attached to it from the latter’s property to his own premises. Defendant testified that he removed the trailer because it was impossible for him at the time to disconnect the vehicles. Later on the same day, Buice found his trailer at the defendant’s place of business where he made demand for its return. According to Buice’s testimony, the defendant stated "Tony McClure owes me $1,800, and the only way you are going to get your trailer is to pay me $1,800.” Defendant while testifying in his own behalf stated that after Buice advised defendant that he, Buice, would obtain a warrant for defendant’s arrest, he disengaged the trailer from the tractor and "I carried the trailer to Acworth, Georgia, and dropped it on a vacant piece of lake property that I owned . . . ,” where it remained for approximately the next 18 months. Defendant admitted that he told no one, other than his lawyers, where the trailer was located during this period. Held:
1. The defendant claims that the evidence is insufficient to authorize a conviction. Assuming but not deciding that defendant was justified in taking the truck and trailer because of an impossibility to disconnect them and thus acquired lawful possession of the trailer, the evidence that defendant would not return the trailer to the owner on demand until the owner paid a debt on the truck owed by someone else shows at that point forward an unlawful appropriation of the trailer with intent to deprive the owner of his property or a theft by taking under Code § 26-1802 (a). Defendant had no right to withhold the property until payment was made for the truck for Buice was not a party to the truck transaction. Secondly, the evidence that defendant, after his encounter with Buice, placed the trailer on vacant lake *797property and there held it for approximately 18 months is a circumstance from which an inference can be drawn that defendant was secreting it. This secreting shows an unlawful appropriation of the property with intent to deprive. The evidence authorized a conviction.
Argued January 11, 1977
Decided February 28, 1977
Rehearing denied March 31, 1977.
George G. Finch, for appellant.
Charles B. Holcomb, District Attorney, for appellee.
2. After the appellant was sentenced, it was ordered by the court that his sentence be served on probation subject to his paying $100 restitution to Mr. Buice. However, "here is dispute as to how.much Mr. Buice was injured by the appellant’s taking of his trailer. "Stated in the negative, the rule is that restitution may not be imposed as a condition in such cases where the amount is in dispute, unless the same has been adjudicated. See Code Ann. § 27-2711 (7) (Ga. L. 1956, pp. 27, 32; 1958, pp. 15, 23; 1965, pp. 413, 416); Biddy v. State, 138 Ga. App. 4 (4).” Payne v. State, 138 Ga. App. 358, 359 (226 SE2d 152) (1976). Therefore, we must reverse the condition of probation requiring restitution.

Judgment affirmed in part and reversed in part.

Bell, C. J., Deen, P. J., Webb, Marshall, McMurray and Shulman, JJ., concur. Quillian, P. J., dissents. Smith, J., concurs in Division 1 of dissent.