Loewenthal v. United States

274 F. 563, 1921 U.S. App. LEXIS 1369
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
DecidedJune 13, 1921
DocketNo. 3449
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 274 F. 563 (Loewenthal v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Loewenthal v. United States, 274 F. 563, 1921 U.S. App. LEXIS 1369 (6th Cir. 1921).

Opinion

KNAPPEN, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff in error, who was a practicing physician at Cleveland, Ohio, was charged under an indictment ■containing 34 counts with violating the so-called Harrison Narcotic Act Dec. 17, 1914, c. 1, 38 Stat. 785, Comp. Stat. § 6287g et seq. At the close of the trial the court withdrew 8 counts from .he jury’s consideration, submitting the remaining 26 counts. There were verdict and judgment of conviction as to 8 of the counts, viz. Nos. 6, 7, 17, 18, 25, 26, 27 and 28, and acquittal as to the remaining counts. In ■each of these eight counts defendant is charged with violating the act, either as a dealer or as a physician, in selling, dispensing, or distributing morphine sulphate. Section 1 of the act, so far as pertinent and applying it concretely to the case presented, in effect requires every person who dispenses, sells, or distributes morphine sulphate to register with the collector of internal revenue of his district and to pay a certain annual tax. Except in the case of a registered physician, when administering or dispensing the drug in good faith to a patient, in the course of medical treatment, section 2 of the act makes it unlawful to sell, barter, exchange, or give away the drug, unless in pursuance of a written order of the person to whom the drug is sold or given, on a form to be issued for the purpose by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue. When, however, a registered physician dispenses or distributes the drug to a patient in the course of his professional practice only, the requirement of form order does not apply, provided he keeps a record of the transaction, showing certain details required by subdivision (a) of section 2, which record, however, need not include ■cases where the drug is dispensed to a patient on whom the physician is in personal attendance. Of the counts on which conviction was had, Nos. 6, 7, and 27 (which were under section 2 of the act) charged that defendant was a practicing physician, and that he unlawfully, etc., sold, bartered, exchanged, and gave away morphine sulphate to Arthur Alexander, Nathan Alexander, and Frank Lawrence, respectively, not in pursuance of written order from the respective vendees; counts' 17, 18, and 26 (under section 1) charged the selling of morphine by defendant as a dealer to Arthur Alexander, Nathan Alexander, and Frank Lawrence, respectively, without having registered as such dealer, and without having paid the statutory tax. Counts 25 and 28 charged defendant with dispensing and distributing morphine to Sarah Roberts and Frank Lawrence, respectively, without keeping the statutory record of the drugs so dispensed and distributed; defendant being then and there a practicing physician and the distributees not being patients upon whom defendant was in personal attendance. The questions presented relate to the sufficiency of the indictment, alleged inconsistency in the verdict, the admission of testimony, and the sufficiency of the evidence.

1. The Sufficiency of the Indictment. — A demurrer directed against ■each count in the indictment, on the ground that the allegations were insufficient to constitute an offense against the law of the United States, was overruled. There was motion in arrest of judgment directed •against this action. There was also motion to quash, likewise over[565]*565ruled, which applied to but three of the counts on which conviction was had, viz. Nos. 17, 18, and 26. The grounds of the motion to quash were, first, duplicity; and second, that each of the counts is vague and indefinite, because failing to show whether defendant was charged with being a dealer without having registered and paid the tax, or merely with making a single sale without having so registered and paid.

[1] The judgment upon conviction was unitary, and covered conviction under each and all of the eight counts, and the punishment imposed was less than might have been imposed under any one of the counts. The judgment is therefore not subject to reversal, if any of the counts on which conviction was had is good and sufficient to support the judgment. Claasen v. United States, 142 U. S. 140, 146, 12 Sup. Ct. 169, 35 L. Ed. 966; Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616, 40 Sup. Ct. 17, 63 L. Ed. 1173; Pierce v. United States, 252 U. S. 252, 253, 40 Sup. Ct. 205, 64 L. Ed. 542.

Under the Anti-Narcotic Act, defendant, if registered and taxed as a physician, was not required to take a written order, or to keep a record of morphine administered by júm to a patient as an element of a good-faith medical treatment; but, although registered and taxed as a physician, and only as a physician, he could not lawfully sell, bargain, or give away morphine without at least taking a written order therefor. As said in Jin Fuey Moy v. United States, 254 U. S. 189, 194, 41 Sup. Ct. 98, 100 (65 L. Ed. —):

“Manifestly, the phrases ‘to a patient’ and ‘in the course of his professional practice1 only’, aro intended to confine the immunity of a registered physician, in dispensing the narcotic drugs mentioned in the act, strictly within the appropriate bounds of a physician’s professional practice, and not. to extend it to include a sale to a dealer or a dUtribuUon intended to cater to the appetite or satisfy the craving of one addicted to the use of the drug.”

And see Webb v. United States, 249 U. S. 96, 99, 39 Sup. Ct. 217, 63 l. Ed. 497.1

[ t J Turning to the four Alexander counts, and counts 26 and 27, which are two of the Lawrence counts: In our opinion neither counts 6, 7, nor 27 are demurrable as failing to state acts constituting an offense. We think they fully define an offense under the act, and gave defendant sufficient notice of the offense charged to enable him to prepare his defense and to protect himself against a subsequent prosecution for the same offense. This is the test of the sufficiency of the counts. United States v. Hess, 124 U. S. 483, 8 Sup. Ct. 571, 31 L. Ed. 516; Daniels v. United States, C. C. A. 6, 196 Fed. 459, 465, 116 C. C. A. 233. Each of these three counts charged that defendant—

“did unlawfully, willfully, knowingly, and feloniously soil, barter,' exchange, and give away derivatives v 4 * of opium, to wit, [a certain number of grains of morphine sulphate.] to * ® * not in pursuance of a written order from the said * * * on a form issued in blank for that purpose by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue of the United States under the provisions of [the Harrison Narcotic Act].”

[566]*566Section 2 of the act, in its opening paragraph, expressly makes it unlawful for “any person” to “sell, barter, exchange or give away” the forbidden narcotics except on a written form order; and if the drug in question was actually sold by the defendant not “within the appropriate bounds” of his professional practice, but only for the purpose of satisfying the cravings of morphine addicts, as the government contends was the case, the fact that defendant was registered as a physician would not relieve him from the obligation to take the form order.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
274 F. 563, 1921 U.S. App. LEXIS 1369, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/loewenthal-v-united-states-ca6-1921.