Morgan v. State

275 S.W. 918, 169 Ark. 579, 1925 Ark. LEXIS 502
CourtSupreme Court of Arkansas
DecidedOctober 19, 1925
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 275 S.W. 918 (Morgan v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Morgan v. State, 275 S.W. 918, 169 Ark. 579, 1925 Ark. LEXIS 502 (Ark. 1925).

Opinion

Smith, J.

Appellant was convicted on his trial upon a charge of having embezzled certain money belonging to the Consumers’ Ice & Coal Company.

The first error assigned for the reversal of the judgment sentencing him to the penitentiary is the refusal of the court to grant his petition for a change of venue. It appears, however, that this petition was not filed until appellant had waived formal arraignment and entered his plea of not guilty and the impaneling of the jury to try the case had progressed to the point where four jurors had been found qualified and had been accepted both by appellant and the State. We think the petition was not filed in. apt time.

The point decided in the case of Clarkson v. State, 165 Ark. 459, has no application here. There the validity of a rule of court was involved which provided that a petition for change of venue would not be entertained by the court unless it were filed within #¡certain time before the case was called for trial. We held the rule was invalid as contravening the right to a change of venue, guaranteed alike by the Constitution and the statute. But in so holding we said: “Under the statute an accused has the right, at any time before' the commencement of a trial, to obtain a change of venue by complying with the requirements of the statute.”

There must, of necessitjq be a time within which the right to apply for a change of venue must be exercised, and beyond which time, if not then exercised, it must be held to have been waived, and that time is, we think, the commencement of the trial. If not exercised by or before that time, the right must be held to have been waived; and the trial from which this appeal is prosecuted had begun when the petition for change of venue was filed.

It is next assigned as error that the court erred in not discharging the panel of the jury and, ordering a new venire upon appellant’s motion that this be done. This motion was predicated upon testimony which was offered and heard by the court on the application for a change of venue. It was developed that all the members of the panel then present resided in or near Pine Bluff, where the trial occurred, and it is insisted that a showing was made that there existed against appellant a sentiment of hostility in that city which would prevent him from obtaining a fair trial. No showing was made or attempted that the regular panel of jurors then present was not regularly selected and summoned. Moreover, it appears that the jury was not completed from among the members of the regular panel, and the court thereafter made an order directing that a special venire of thirty-five jurors should be summoned from outside Pine Bluff. It further appears that defendant did not exhaust the peremptory challenges allowed him by law in impanelling the jury.

Appellant was the principal stockholder in and a director and the president of the Consumers’ Ice & Coal Company, a corporation!. The undisputed testimony showed that he had possession of $37,000 in money belonging to that company, which he did not pay over on demand. Appellant was engaged in the general brokerage business, which he conducted under the name of S. R. Morgan & Company, and it was the theory of the defense that the ice company’s money had been deposited with Morgan, doing business as S. R. Morgan & Company, under an agreement on the part of Morgan to pay to the ice company interest on the daily balances, and that the money admittedly in his hands was a mere loan which he was unable to repay, but which he had on several occasions offered to repay upon condition that the ice company pay an indebtedness alleged to be due by it to the Republic Power & Service Company, a corporation largely owned by Morgan.

It was the theory of the prosecution that Morgan dominated the ice company as well as certain other corporations in which he owned the controlling stock, and that the directors were mere “sign here” men, who did his every bidding, and that there was no necessary or proper relation between these corporations, yet appellant so related their affairs that he could use each of them to exploit the other.

The theory on which the conviction was asked, and was obtained by the State, is reflected in an instruction, numbered B, which reads as follows: “Even though you may believe that a resolution was passed by the board of directors of the Consumers’ Ice & Coal Company authorizing- the loaning of the funds of the company to S. R. Morgan & Company, and that a contract was entered into between the Consumers’ Ice & Coal Company and S. R. Morgan & Company in pursuance to this resolution, still,, if you believe beyond a reasonable doubt from all the facts and circumstances in this case that said resolution was passed as a subterfuge only to make that appear as legal which otherwise would not be, then the passage of such a resolution, if you believe one was passed, would not be a defense.”

Appellant earnestly insists that the giving of this instruction was error, for the reasons, first, that it is not the law in any case, and, second, there was no testimony to justify giving it in the instant case.

A summary of the testimony will be required to dispose of these assignments of error, and in doing so we give bo the testimony tending to support the verdict its highest probative value.

The Consumers’ Ice & Coal Company was a prosperous going concern on January 13, 1920, and was paying annually and regularly to its stockholders a dividend of ten per cent, and the stock had a book value of $1.75. On the date mentioned appellant acquired a majority of the stock, and new directors were elected, appellant being-one of these, and his brother another, and the other two were appellant’s employees and were dominated by him.

The ice company had a large revenue, and carried large daily balances in each of two banks in Pine Bluff. Neither of these banks had allowed the ice company any interest on these balances. Mclndoo was installed as manager after Morgan had obtained control of a majority of the stock of the ice company, and Mclndoo was later elected a director. Beginning April '20, 1920, Mclndoo began remitting to S. R. Morgan & Company various sums of ¡money in the form of checks, and this practice continued until November 29, 1921, by which time these remittances aggregated $31,657.45. Another item brought the total to the approximate sum of $37,000.This item arose out of the sale of certain treasury stock of the ice company, which was bought ¡by Morgan, and in payment of which he gave a draft on a bank which closed its doors before the draft was presented for payment. Thereafter the draft was charged to Morgan both on the books of the ice company and on the books of Morgan & Company. The remittances composing these sums appeared on the books of the ice company, which Mclndoo caused to be entered by the company’s bookkeeper. It is further contended by the State that Morgan appropriated and embezzled certain other assets of the ice company, all of which, together, totaled $85,000.

The items beyond the $37,000 may be disposed of by saying that, if the ice company sustained those losses, there was nothing connected with the losses which would support the charge of embezzlement.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Brown v. State
395 S.W.2d 344 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1965)
Trotter & Harris v. State
377 S.W.2d 14 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1964)
Rutledge v. State
262 S.W.2d 650 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1953)
Central Surety Fire Corporation v. Williams
211 S.W.2d 891 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1948)
Heath v. State
181 S.W.2d 231 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1944)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
275 S.W. 918, 169 Ark. 579, 1925 Ark. LEXIS 502, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/morgan-v-state-ark-1925.