People Ex Rel. Perkins v. . Moss

80 N.E. 383, 187 N.Y. 410, 20 N.Y. Crim. 569, 25 Bedell 410, 1907 N.Y. LEXIS 797

• Court: New York Court of Appeals
• Decided: February 26, 1907
• Status: Published

Opinions

Gray, J.

If the information, which was laid before the magistrate furnished no legal evidence of the commission of a crime by the relator, then he was illegally restrained of his liberty. If the facts shown did not warrant an inference by the magistrate of the existence of probable cause to believe that the crime charged had been committed, he was without jurisdiction to cause the arrest of the relator and the latter was entitled to resort at once for his protection to the writ of habeas corpus. Section 2015 of the Code of Civil Procedure provides that “ a person imprisoned or restrained in his liberty, within the State, for any cause, or upon any pretence, is entitled, * * * to a writ of habeas corpus, or a writ of certiorari, as prescribed in this article, for the purpose of inquiring into the cause of the imprisonment or restraint, and, in a case prescribed by law, of delivering him therefrom.” The petitioner is only required to state, among other things, that he “ is imprisoned, or restrained in his liberty; the place where, * * * and the officer or person by whom, he is so imprisoned or restrained.” (Sec. 2019, Code Civ. Proc.) The arrest of the relator was ah actual restraint of his person, and he was not obliged to await an examination before the magistrate. The provision of the statute, in that respect, was for his benefit; in order that he might be informed of the charge and that he might have the opportunity to examine the witnesses and to make any statement in relation to the charge. (See Code Crim. Proc. secs. 188 to 197.) He could waive these proceedings, however, and immediately sue out the writs that the legality of his detention under arrest might be inquired into. The statute, which confers the right to the writ of habeas corpus, has always been construed in favor of the liberty of the citizen. The protection afforded by it against arbitrary and illegal arrest is within the guaranties of our Constitution, and the statutes of the state have always been intended to increase the facilities for the issuance of this great and valuable common- law writ and to insure the prompt hearing and disposition of the petitioner’s case.

If the magistrate issued the warrant of arrest without sufficient evidence in the particular case, the process is a nullity. The question, always, must be whether the magistrate acquired jurisdiction to cause an arrest of the person and the coui% upon the habeas corpus proceeding, will look back of his warrant and see if the facts stated in the depositions of the .prosecutor and his witnesses support his warrant. (Code Crim. Proc. sec. 149; Church Hab. Corp. sec. 236.) If they did not furnish reasonable and just ground for a conclusion that the crime charged had been committed and that the defendant committed it, then jurisdiction was lacking to hold the prisoner in custody for any time. (Code Crim. Proc. sec. 150.)

The relator had the absolute right to question, in this way, the sufficiency of the facts laid before the magistrate to constitute the crime of larceny. That crime is defined in section 528 of the Penal Code; which reads, so far as material, as follows: “ A person who, with the intent to deprive or defraud the true owner of his property, or of the use and benefit thereof, or to appropriate the same to the use of the taker, or of any other person, * * * having in his possession, custody, or control, as a bailee, servant, attorney, agent, clerk, trustee, or officer of any person, association or corporation, * * * any money, property, evidence of debt or contract, article of valúe of any nature, or thing in action or possession, appropriates the same to his own use, or that of any other person other than the true owner or person entitled to the benefit thereof, steals such property, and is guilty of larceny.”

It is apparent that what constitutes the crime of taking the property of another for the use of the taker, or of that of any other person than the legal owner, is the intention with which the act is committed. Under the statute, the crime of larceny no longer necessitates a trespass; but it does need, as an essen tial element that the “ intent to deprive or defraud ” the owner of his property, or of its use, shall exist. The intent, by necessary implication, as from' its place in the penal statute, must be felonious; that is to say, an intent without an honest claim of right. It is not now essential, as it was under the Roman and early English law, that the intention of the taker shall be to reap any advantage from the taking. The statute makes the crime to consist in the intent to despoil the owner of his property. That is necessary to complete the offense and if a man,, under the honest impression that he has a right to the property, takes it, it is not larceny, if there be a colorable title. (See Code Grim. Proc. sec. 548; People v. Grim, 3 N Y. Cr. Rep. 317; Bishop’s Crim. Law, secs. 297, 851; Wharton’s Grim. Law, secs. 883, 884.) The charge of stealing property is only substantiated by establishing the felonious intent. Without it there is no crime; for it would be a bare trespass. It is the criminal mind and purpose going with the act, which distinguish the criminal trespass from a mere civil injury. (1 Hale’s P. C. 509; McCourt v. People, 64 N Y. 583.) Doubtless, if the particular act was specified in the penal statute, an honest belief that it was right, while it would purge the act from immorality, would not relieve it from indictability. But when there is no statute on the subject and the act is not one which concerns the state directly, because affecting the peace, order, comfort, or health, of the community, then the wrong done is private in its character and must be redressed by private suit. The act of the president of the insurance company, which the relator may be regarded as abetting, (Sec. 29, Penal Code), that is the contribution of corporate funds for the purpose of a political campaign, was not malum prohibitum, or a prohibited wrong; for it was not until two years later that it was made a misdemeanor by the law of 1906. (L. 1906, ch. 239.)

The legislature may make that criminal, which was not so before; but we may not reason back of the enactment and predicate crime of an act, which was lacking in criminal intent. It is of the very nature of crime that the criminal act shall involve the violation of a public law, or a wrong, which, because grossly immoral and vicious, affects the public injuriously.

If we turn then to a consideration of the facts, upon which the magistrate ordered the relator to be arrested, it is impossible reasonably speaking, to find that criminal element which the statute makes a necessary one, the intent of the accused to steal.

When summed up, the evidence amounts to this: that the .president of the company, in whom was vested, and who had for years been exercising, the power to make disbursements of the corporate funds upon his sole authority, had agreed that the insurance company would contribute to the presidential campaign fund of the Republican national committee up to the amount of $50,000 and that, to protect the company against other demands for political purposes, he requested the relator, one of the company’s trustees, to personally carry out the agreement, by advancing the moneys. The relator acquiesced in the president’s request, advanced the money, and, subsequently, the president brought up the subject of his reimbursement, informally, before a full attendance of the members of the finance committee of the company. The president’s purpose was not that the finance committee should take official action in the matter; but that the trustees should be informed of what he had done and that he might have their opinions upon the matter. It was the general opinion that the president should cause the relator to be reimbursed for his advancés out of the corporate funds. The facts stated by the witnesses showed that what was brought before this body of the company’s trustees was the claim, or right, of Mr. Perkins to be repaid the moneys which he had paid out by the procurement of the president, in order that the latter’s agreement on behalf of the company might be carried out, and that the president, exercising the executive power, with which he appears to have been clothed, directed the treasurer of the company to draw the check for the amount of the relator’s claim. Furthermore, the prosecution in making use before the magistrate of the relator’s letter to the district attorney, as an admission of the facts of the transaction complained of, not only made the fact clear that the moneys were paid out to satisfy the relator’s claim, but, also, caused it to appear, affirmatively, that the relator had acted in the honest belief that he was benefiting the company and had derived no personal advantage. The magistrate was not bound to accept the letter as establishing the innocence of the accused; but, as a part of the evidence used to make out the charge, he had his statements explaining the transaction and stating his honest motives. It was equivalent to his examination.

It is, unquestionably, true that the purpose, for which the moneys of the company were promised, was foreign to the chartered purposes of the corporation; but that fact does not make the payment a criminal act. The act not being malum prohibitum, nor malum in se, the innocent motive of indirectly promoting the corporate affairs, through the supposed advantage of the continuance in power of the Republican administration, purged the act of immorality and it lacked the criminal intent. The company had not the right, under the law of its existence to agree to make contributions for political campaigns, any more than to agree to do other things foreign to its charter; but it had capacity to make agreements, if not prohibited, or inherently wicked. Its act would affect the interests of those concerned with the conduct of the corporate business and effect a private wrong; but it would not be a public offense, or illegal, in the sense of violating any public interest. (Bissell v. M. S. & N. I. R. R. Co., 22 N. Y. 258; Holmes v. Willard, 125 ib. 75; Moss v. Cohen, 158 ib. 240.) If making the agreement to contribute from the corporate funds was an illegal act, it was because of the limitations upon the corporate powers and not because of considerations of the disadvantage to the company of the act. There are a great many things, which those intrusted with the management of corporate properties are known to do and which they ought not to do, whatever their good motives, not because some statute forbids, but because they are not within the scope of the chartered powers. Their own sense of rectitude and of what is due to those who trust them should admonish them of the wrongful nature of their conduct. It has been well observed that the ultimate welfare of the citizen demands that he shall conform his conduct to the moral law and it concerns him that everyone else should conform to it. A moral obligation should be none the less authoritative in the conduct of life that it is binding, only, upon the conscience of the person as a duty and is imperfect in law from the absence of legal sanction. Courts, however, may not sit to judge the conduct of a defendant by any moral code, or rules of ethics. Their sphere is to ascertain if the facts shown establish the crime charged against him. In the facts stated in these depositions I find none, upon which criminality can-be predicated. The essential element of the “ intent to deprive and defraud ” is nowhere to be found and there is no just basis for the inference. There was no concealment about the transaction and knowledge of it was conveyed to the other trustees. That the relator may have made a mistake of law, which will not relieve him from liability in a civil action, may be true, and he expressly disclaimed in his letter any intention to dispute such a liability; but this was a case where the intent, or good faith, was in issue and then knowledge of the law is immaterial. (Knowles v. City of N. Y.) 176 N. Y. at p. 439; Goodspeed v. Ithaca St. Ry. Co., 184 ib. at p. 354.) The relator came to the aid of the president of the company, who, as such, had agreed to contribute moneys to the campaign fund, and advanced the moneys, temporarily. Having done so, for no other reason than for the supposed ad vantage of the company, his claim to he reimbursed from the treasury of the company is openly presented and it is paid. But within the spirit, if not the letter, of section 548 of the Penal Code, that was not larceny. The section provides that “ upon an indictment for larceny it is a sufficient defense that the property was appropriated openly and avowedly, under a claim of title preferred in good faith, even though such claim is untenable.” This section is an expression of the emphasis which the statute lays upon the intent with which the property of another is taken. It is a qualification of the provisions of section 528 of the Penal Code, defining what shall constitute the crime of larceny. It is of considerable significance, as illustrating the legislative understanding, that when, in 1900, the legislature dealt with the question, specifically, the offense was declared to be a misdemeanor, not a larceny.

The question in this case was whether the facts evidenced the commission of a crime and that was a question of law, which went to the jurisdiction of the magistrate. They showed that the design to injure, the motive to despoil the company, the wrongful purpose were, all, lacking in the information, which was laid before the magistrate and upon which the warrant was issued. This being so, the act of the magistrate was wholly without jurisdiction and the warrant and all the proceedings under it were absolutely void. (Hewitt v. Newbur ger, 141 N. Y. 538, 543.)

For these reasons, I advise the affirmance of the order appealed from.