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52 Wis. 217

Powell v. State

Wisconsin Supreme Court

Decided May 10, 1881

Wisconsin Supreme Court · decided 1881-05-10

An information .was filed by the district attorney in said court against James U. Powell and four others, charging that they “ did feloniously break and enter in the night time a certain railroad freight car then and there being the property of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company, with intent feloniously to steal, take and carry away the goods and chattels of said company, then and there being in said car.” There was a verdict of guilty against all the…

Decided 1881-05-10

By the Court.

¶11. The conviction of the plaintiffs in error of the crime charged in the information cannot be disturbed, for want of testimony tending to show the felonious intent charged therein. There was sufficient proof of such intent to send that question to the jury.

¶22. Conceding that the plaintiffs in error entered the car in the county of Jefferson, if, with the same felonious intent, they continued therein until the car passed into the county of Columbia, the offense charged was committed in the latter as well as in the former county. The felonious intent not being abandoned, it is a. fresh entry in each county into which the car was taken while they so remained in the car. This is held in analogy to the common-law rule that where a person steals goods in one county and carries them into another county, the *219felonious intent continuing, it is a fresh larceny in such other county. 1 Bish. Cr. Pr., § 59. There seems to be no distinction in principle between the two cases. We are referred to no direct authority on the precise question here, and probably there is none, as the offense is a statutory one, and such statutes are of comparatively recent origin. Unless we apply to the case the principle above stated, it would be difficult to convict any one for breaking or entering a moving car with intent to commit a felony.

¶3This view sustains the instructions 'which the judge gave to the jury.

¶4The judgment is affirmed.

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