People v. Bevins

26 N.Y. Crim. 500, 74 Misc. 377, 134 N.Y.S. 212
CourtNew York County Courts
DecidedNovember 15, 1911
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 26 N.Y. Crim. 500 (People v. Bevins) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York County Courts primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Bevins, 26 N.Y. Crim. 500, 74 Misc. 377, 134 N.Y.S. 212 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1911).

Opinion

Hazard, J.:

On the 12th day of February, 1911, this defendant and a party of friends were walking upon a public highway in the city of Utica in the afternoon, and they met a magistrate of the City Court of that city; and an altercation occurred between the defendant and his friends on one side, and the magistrate upon the other, in the course of which it is claimed and proven that the defendant used some exceedingly vile and obscene language ; and a fight occurred which was commenced by the magistrate, but under circumstances which make it rather fair to infer that, if he had not commenced it when he did, the defendant and his party would have assaulted him. The day was Sunday, and there were quite a number of persons present or in the immediate vicinity, including a number of women and children.

Defendant was arrested and tried for public intoxication in the City Court of Utica, and convicted and sentenced to a short term of imprisonment. He has also been arrested, tried, and, after several trials, convicted of disorderly conduct under section 720 of the Penal Law. From the latter conviction he has appealed to this court. Undeniably both convictions were for the same occurrence; that is, growing out of the transaction briefly outlined above. On the trial of this action in City Court defendant pleaded" not guilty; and he also entered the special plea in effect that he had already been convicted for the same offense. In other words, it is defendant’s contention herein that the prior conviction for public intoxication was the same transaction and embraced the same offense for which he was subsequently tried and convicted for disorderly conduct; and the question whether it is or not is the sole question of any importance in this case.

Undoubtedly the Legislature can carve out of a single act or transaction several crimes, so that the individual may, at the [502]*502same time and in the same transaction, commit several distinct crimes, in which case an acquittal or a conviction of one will not be a bar to an indictment for another. (12 Cyc. 282; U. S. v. Harmison, 26 Fed. Cas. 165.) Section 9 of the Code of Criminal Procedure provides that: “No person can be subjected to a second prosecution for a crime for which he has once been prosecuted, and duly convicted or acquitted.” Very numerous cases in the books decide that the criminal acts referred to must be identical to come within the rule, but there exists a surprising diversity of opinion in connection with oases where there have been indictments for two or more alleged crimes growing out of the same transaction. The general rule is that, to be available, the former conviction or acquittal must be on a prosecution for the identical act or crime; and the difficulty of application here grows out of the claim of the people that there were several offenses or crimes involved in the same transaction; and the question we have to decide is as to whether Bevins, in the affair outlined above, committed one or two offenses, or, to put the same proposition in another way, was the use of profane and obscene language in this public place included in and a part of the crime of public intoxication for which he has already been tried and convicted % It may be said that there is probably no doubt but that the evidence in both cases was quite similar, and it is doubtless true that the evidence of the profane and obscene language at that time and place, taken in connection with the other facts, was an element of proof in establishing the intoxication of the defendant; but this does not necessarily prove that the two crimes are the same. To render the plea of a former conviction available, it must have been for the same identical crime. (People v. Saunders, 4 Park. Crim. 198.) It is also said that, to constitute a bar, the offense charged in both indictments must be identically the same both in law and in fact. (People v. Birch, 5 N. Y. Crim. 30; 17 Am. & Eng. Ency. of Law (2d ed.) 596.) Ap[503]*503plying this test, it is obvious that the crime of public intoxication and the crime of disorderly conduct are not the same in law., however closely they might happen to be allied in fact. It is; laid down as a principle well established that, unless the first; indictment was such as the prisoner might have been convicted upon by proof of the facts contained in the second indictment,, an acquittal on the first indictment can be no bar to the second. (Burns & Carey v. People, 1 Park. Cr. Rep. 184; People v. Birch, 5 N. Y. Crim. 30; People v. Saunders, 4 Park. Cr. Rep.. 198; 17 Am. & Eng. Ency. of Law [2d ed.] 597; 12 Cyc. 280.) Applying this test also to the case at bar, it seems to be obvious' that the crimes are separate and distinct as a matter of law, although they may be closely related on the facts. A man may be intoxicated without using profane and obscene language, and, vice versa, he may use profane and obscene language in excess without being intoxicated. Defendant could not have been convicted of the crime of public intoxication by proof of any quantity of obscene and profane language. There must have been other proof. As a matter of fact, there was proof in the intoxication case that he talked loudly, walked unsteadily and staggered. A case in which the distinction just made is well illustrated is Morey v. Commonwealth (108 Mass. 433), in which it is said: “A conviction or acquittal upon one indictment is no bar to a subsequent conviction and sentence upon another, unless the evidence required to support a conviction upon one off them would have been sufficient to warrant a conviction upon the other. The test is not whether the defendant has already been tried for the same act, but whether he has been put in jeopardy for the same offense. A single act may be an offense against two statutes; and if each statute requires proof of an additional fact which the other does not, an acquittal or conviction under either statute does not exempt the defendant from, prosecution and punishment under the other.”

[504]*504Starting out with the above as an authoritative statement of the law involved, and assuming the disorderly conduct of the defendant, so far as profane and obscene language goes, as in proof, we find that to convict him of public intoxication there must have been other evidence adduced; and there was other evidence adduced in the intoxication case, as outlined above. JSTow, taking the case at bar and assuming the same proof in evidence regarding the profane and obscene language, we again cannot convict unless there is other proof, to wit, that it must have annoyed or interfered with some person or persons, as provided in section 720 of the Penal Law. A case illustrative of the lack of identity of the two charges, which seem to be more or less familiar, is that of Ball v. State (67 Miss. 358), in which a defendant had been convicted of drunkenness and swearing in a public place in the presence of two or more persons; and it was held that conviction was no bar to a subsequent indictment for disturbing religious worship, although the whole affair was really one and the same transaction; thex court holding that the crime of disturbing religious worship invblved other modes than by being drunk and profane, and, therefore, there was a want of identity of the two charges.”

I think we must, therefore, assume that there was in this case, or in these cases, two separate and distinct crimes com-l mitted. There is nothing unusual or extraordinary about such) .a state of affairs.

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Bluebook (online)
26 N.Y. Crim. 500, 74 Misc. 377, 134 N.Y.S. 212, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-bevins-nycountyct-1911.