Volume 6 — Parker's Criminal Reports

The prisoner and others pleaded not guilty to the following indictment for robbery in the first degree: City and County of New York, ss: The jurors of the People of the State of New York, in in and for the body of the city and county of New York, upon their oath present: That Rosanna Quinlan, late of the First ward of the city of New York, in . the county of New York aforesaid, James Quinlan, Margaret E. M. Smith,, and Catharine Kinsley, late of the same place, on the…

The prisoner was indicted for manslaughter as follows: City and County of New York, ss: The jurors of the people of the State of New York,… Held: the same being a deadly weapon, the said David, in and upon the left side of the chest of him the said David, then and there feloniously and willfully did strike and thrust, giving to the said David then and there, with the knife aforesaid, in and upon the aforesaid left side of the chest of him the said David one mortal wound, of…

<p>In an indictment for obtaining money by false pretenses, the name of the person defrauded was charged to be John J. Robinson. The evidence showed his name was spelt Robison. The recorder charged the jury that it was for them to determine whether the two names had the same sound ; and that if the sound was not the same, it was their duty to acquit. On review, the charge was held to be correct.</p> <p>The indictment charged the obtaining of two hundred and fifty dollars from R., by means of a false pretense. The proof showed that the prisoner, who had induced R. to enlist, had in his hands three hundred dollars, which he told R. belonged to him for his bounty money, and paid R. fifty dollars out of it, and on a false pretense obtained an assignment to the ■ prisoner of the three hundred dollars bounty money, upon which assignment the prisoner received the bounty money from the proper officer on the next day. Held, that it was not erroneous for the recorder to charge ‘‘that if, at the time'R. executed the assignment of his claim upon the county for three hundred dollars bounty, the prisoner had in his possession the amount of money mentioned in the indictment, and it was considered by both parties to belong to R., and the prisoner would have paid it over to R. except for the consent of R. that he might retain it, that was just as much an obtaining of the two hundred and fifty dollars, mentioned in the indictment, as if he had paid it over to R. and received it back from him.”</p> <p>In an indictment for having obtained money by false pretenses it was charged that the prisoner falsely represented that he was a captain in the Sixth New York cavalry. Held, that the fact was a material one, and one by which a person of ordinary prudence might have been influenced, it appearing that the money obtained by the pretenses was bounty money, and that the person from whom the money was obtained expected to serve in a military company to be commanded by the prisoner.</p> <p>Form of an indictment for obtaining bounty money by false pretenses.</p> <p>Charge of the recorder explaining the rules of law applicable to such cases.</p>

The defendant was tried on an indictment for the murder of Huldah Ann McCraney, the daughter of John P. McCraney by a former wife. At the time of the transaction in question, he was living with ,the defendant as her husband. It was charged that the murder was committed by the injection of arsenic into the rectum of the deceased.

The defendant was indicted for illegal voting at the general election in November, 1864. Held: made a bet upon the result of said election: And thereupon the counsel for the defendant moved the court to quash the said indictment upon the ground, 1st. That said indictment did not set forth any offense upon which the defendant could be tried. 2d. That inasmuch as the statute sets forth different offenses, the particular offense…

The prisoner was tried in the Court of Sessions of Chemung county, in December, 1866, and found guilty of an attempt to commit the crime of arson in the third degree, and was sentenced by that court to be imprisoned in the State prison, at hard labor, for the term of one year and four months. .

The prisoner, Donoghoe, was convicted at the Broome County Court of Sessions, in December, 1865, of placing obstructions on the railroad track .between Binghamton and Syracuse, and was sentenced to be imprisoned in the State prison for the term of two year’s. The execution of the sentence was stayed by the judge who allowed the writ of error by which the record of the trial in the case has been brought into this court.

This was a writ of error to the Livingston County Court of Sessions—the questions raised are sufficiently stated in the opinion of the court.

The defendant was indicted, tried, and convicted in the court below for the crime of abduction.

This case came before the general term, under the thirty-fifth section of the act authorizing the Superior Court at general term to review upon the indictment and a bill of exceptions the decisions of the trial term. (Laws 1854, p. 96; Laws 1857, p. 752.) ■ The indictment contained four counts.

This case was brought before this court from the Oyer and Terminer of Chemung county by a writ of certiorari, in the following form: The People of the State of New YorJc: To the court of Oyer and Terminer,' in and for the county of Chemung: We, having been informed that Henry Gardiner, a soldier in the service of the United States Governmént, was lately in said court arraigned for the crime of murder, upon an indictment therein before found against the said Henry Gardiner,…

This cause came before this court by writ of error from the Chemung County Oyer and Terminer. The trial took place in April, 1866, before Mr. Justice Balcom, and the justices of the Sessions.

The plaintiff in error was indicted in the Court of General Sessions of New York, at the April term, 1868, for murder, in taking the life of his wife Delia, on the 26th day of March, 1866. The indictment contained three counts, alleging severally a killing: first, with an axe; secondly, with a knife; and, thirdly, by beating and choking. He was tried at the June term, 1867, the Hon. John K. Hackett, recorder, presiding.

Joel Lindsley was tried at the Oyer and Terminer held in Orleans county in January, 1847, upon an indictment for manslaughter in the second degree; also in the third degree. He was convicted of manslaughter in the second degree. Humorous exceptions were taken during the trial. Those which are considered by the court are stated in the following opinion:

<p>In an indictment for larceny, a count charging that a certain number of written promises for the payment of money, called bank bills, of the value and denomination of five dollars each, were feloniously stolen and taken from the person of D. M., without alleging that the act was done in the “ night time,” and without alleging that the property was of the value of more than twenty-five dollars, is good, as a charge of grand larceny, under the act of 1862, chapter 374, section 2.</p> <p>On the-trial of an indictment for stealing a bank bill from D. M., it is not error in the court to refuse to charge that the fact that the bill had been paid to him for services and received by him in payment was no evidence that the bill was genuine or of the value of the sum which it purported to represent.</p> <p>The presumption in such case is in favor of the genuineness of the bill, and the onus of proving the contrary rests upon the defendant.</p>

The plaintiff was tried on a charge of grand larceny. Patrick Graham, the complainant, was a witness for the people, and on the cross-examination he was asked if he did not say to Thaddeus C. Davis, Esq., on the day of the arrest of .the prisoner and afterwards, that if the prisoner would refund to him a part of the money he had lost, he would not swear against him. Graham answered that he had made. no such statement.

<p>State courts and State judges have jurisdiction in proceedings by habeas corpus in cases of persons detained by United States officers under claim of enlistment and desertion, or under color of illegal enlistment, or other pretense of authority of the United States, and may order the discharge of such persons, if the detention be unlawful.</p> <p>A prior adjudication under a writ of habeas corpus is not a bar to a subsequent proceeding of a like character.</p> <p>Where, in a return to a writ of habeas corpus, it was stated that the petitioner was a regularly enlisted soldier in the army of the United States, and was held to service therein by virtue of such enlistment, and that he had deserted the service and had been arrested and was then held to be tried by a general court martial, a court of the United States having exclusively competent jurisdiction, and such facts of enlistment and desertion were put in issue by a traverse of the return; held, that it was the duty of the court to inquire into and decide upon the fact of enlistment, and on being satisfied that the prisoner had never enlisted, to discharge the petitioner from custody.</p> <p>On the trial, on habeas corpus, of a question of fact in the United States District Court, the petitioner is a competent witness.</p>

The prisoner was indicted, tried and convicted of the crime of murder, for killing George Dill, on the morning of the 10th January, 1865, at the house of Mrs. Cooley, on Oak street, in the city of Buffalo.

The plaintiff in error was tried and convicted in the Court of Sessions of .Orleans County, upon an indictment charging him with the offense of creating and maintaining a nuisance. The indictment contains two counts.

The defendant was indicted, tried and convicted before the Court of Sessions of Niagara county, for a misdemeanor. Certain exceptions were taken by him to the rulings of the court upon the trial, and the proceedings were stayed, and brought before this court by writ of certiorari. The indictment charged the defendant with a violation of the Excise law, in selling various kinds of strong and spirituous liquors without license, and among them lager beer.

The prisoner was arraigned and pleaded not guilty to the following indictment: 8t. Lawrence county, ss: The jurors of the people of the State of New York, in and for the body of the county of St. Lawrence, to wit: Harlow Godard, Schuyler Briggs, William Furness, Adam Pike, Lewis Bartholomew, John Hay, H. F. Taylor, Isaac Sheldon, Joseph B. Ellsworth, Charles J. Gillett, Joseph Frith, Andrew Dalzell, George Woodbridge, James F. Brownell, George!

The prisoner was arraigned on an indictment charging her with the murder of Harvey Burdell by stabbing, and pleaded not guilty.

<p>Error to the Columbia Oyer and Terminer, in which court the prisoner was tried and convicted of murder. The questions involved sufficiently appear in the opinion of the court.</p>

An indictment for robbery was found against the prisoner in the following words: State of New York, Livingston County, ss: The jurors of the people of the State of Hew York, in and for the body of the county of Livingston, upon their oath present: That Eli H. Hall, late of the town of Geneseo, in the county of Livingston aforesaid, on the nineteenth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, at the town and county aforesaid, with force…

<p>Writ of Error to the Court of Oyer and Terminer of Ontario county.</p> <p>The defendant was indicted for burglary in the first degree, after a previous conviction for a felony, jointly with one Curtis, and was tried separately, having claimed so to be tried at the November Oyer and Terminer in Ontario county, 1861. At the trial the regular panel of jurors was exhausted before, the jury was filled, and the court ordered the sheriff to draw fifteen names from the box provided by the cleric, containing the names of all persons who had been selected and returned as suitable persons to serve as jurors, and who resided in the town of Canandaigua, where said court was held, pursuant to sec. 2d, chap. 10, of the Session Laws of 1861, which order was objected to by defendant’s counsel, and the objection overruled, and the defendant excepted.</p> <p>The sheriff having returned the list of jurors so drawn as duly summoned, the defendant’s counsel challenged the array because the sheriff did not personally summon all the jurors — some having been served by one deputy and some by another, and the residue by the sheriff. The challenge was denied and these facts proved. The court then overruled the challenge, and the defendant’s counsel duly excepted.</p> <p>In calling the jury, the district attorney claimed the right to challenge one juror peremptorily in behalf of the people, to which the prisoner’s counsel objected, and the court overruled the objection and allowed the challenge, and the juror was set aside, and the defendant’s counsel excepted.</p> <p>The defendant was convicted and sentenced to the State prison for ten years and five months.</p> <p>Some of the counts of the indictment were for burglary, some for larceny, and some for receiving the stolen property, knowing it to be stolen.</p> <p>It was objected that the verdict was irregular, because it did not find upon all the counts, but found the defendant simply guilty. Also, because it did not appear upon the record that the prisoner, before sentence, was asked why sentence should not be passed upon him. .</p>

<p>The right given by the Revised Statutes to obtain a review of a criminal case on exceptions supersedes the necessity for the practice previously established, by which an inferior court of criminal jurisdiction, after conviction, suspended sentence and asked for and obtained the advice of the Supreme Court as to doubtful questions of law that had arisen oh the trial.</p> <p>Such practice, however, has not been abolished, and it is competent for the Supreme Court to entertain such an application, and to decide it upon its merits.</p> <p>Where an indictment contained two counts, one for larceny and the other for receiving stolen property, knowing it to have been stolen, and the jury found a general verdict of guilty, and it appeared that both counts related to the same transaction, held, that there was no ground for sustaining a . motion in arrest of judgment, but that judgment should be given for the highest grade of offense.</p> <p>A motion in arrest of judgment is not limited to the indictment, but may be made on the whole record, which includes the verdict.</p> <p>Form of an entry on the record made by the Court of Sessions, for the 'purpose of asking the advice of the Supreme Court upon questions of law involved in the case.</p>

<p>Certiorari from the Saratoga County Sessions.</p>

On the night of Thursday, the 24th of April, 1867, the barn of the Rev. John Gaston, Saugerties, Ulster county, was- broken open, and a set of harness,, a lap robe, net, blanket, whip and umbrella, stolen therefrom. The stolen articles were found on the boat of the prisoner, at Tivoli, Dutchess county, on Monday, April 29th, five days after the burglary. The harness, robe, blanket and net, were in a box on the deck of the boat', and the umbrella and whip in the cabin.

This case came before Mr. Justice Nelson, of the Supreme Court of the United States, at Chambers, on a petition duly verified. A writ of habeas corpus had been allowed, directed to Amos Pilsbury, Superintendent of the Albany Penitentiary.

The plaintiff in error was indicted in the Oyer and Terminer of Washington county, for forgery, &c. The indictment contained nine counts.