People v. Parkinson

33 P.2d 18, 138 Cal. App. 599, 1934 Cal. App. LEXIS 718
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedMay 22, 1934
DocketCrim. No. 1355
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 33 P.2d 18 (People v. Parkinson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Parkinson, 33 P.2d 18, 138 Cal. App. 599, 1934 Cal. App. LEXIS 718 (Cal. Ct. App. 1934).

Opinion

PLUMMER, J.

On the twenty-first day of November, 1933, an information was filed in the Superior Court of the County of Sacramento, charging the appellant, together with Frank Crawshaw and F. E. Collins, with the crime of burglary, alleged to have been committed in the city and county of Sacramento, on or about the eleventh day of October, 1933, in that the said defendants did enter the office of the Rainier Distributing Company, located in a building situate at 1808 Twenty-second Street, in the city and county of Sacramento. To this information the defendants Crawshaw and Collins, during the course of the trial subsequently had thereon, entered pleas of guilty. The appellant was found guilty of burglary in the second degree, and from the judgment pronounced upon the verdict rendered against him, and from the order of the court denying his motion for a new trial, this appeal is prosecuted.

Two questions are submitted for our consideration: 1st: That the evidence is insufficient to support the verdict; and 2d: That the court erred in denying the appellant’s motion for a new trial.

The record shows that the Rainier Distributing Company had an office at 1808 Twenty-second Street, and in the [601]*601office there was a safe belonging to the company. On the evening of October 10, 1933, the managers of the company left the office at about 7:30 o ’clock in the evening; that the safe in the office which we have mentioned contained some $800 in currency and checks, and also other papers not necessary to be mentioned here. The office had one door leading out into another portion of the building. When the managers left the office of the company they locked the safe, and also the door which we have mentioned. When one of the managers returned to the office on the morning of October 11th, he found the safe open; the dial that controlled the combination was knocked off; papers were on the floor; money and cheeks were gone. At about 1 o’clock on the morning of October 11th, two police officers, one named Catlett and the other Kenealy, were patroling the district in the vicinity of 1808 Twenty-second Street, and saw two men who were about one-half a block from the Rainier Distributing Company’s office. The officers stopped the two men; made inquiries as to how they happened to be there, and where they were going; to which the men replied that they had just got off of a freight train and were on their way to the lower end of town. It so happened that they were traveling in a direction other .than that toward the lower end of town. Thereupon, the officers proceeded to search the defendants Crawshaw and Collins. In this search they found considerable money in the pockets of one of the defendants, and money in the cap of another of the defendants. They also found a number of checks; also, a flashlight was found in the pocket of one of the defendants, and two 12-gauge shotgun shells, loaded with No. 2 shots. The defendants Crawshaw and Collins were sent to the police station at approximately 1:30 o’clock; thereafter, at approximately 3 o’clock, a telephone call was received at the police station, inquiring about Crawshaw and Collins. The person making the inquiry represented himself as Luke Howe. The officers proceeded to check the telephone call, found the number of the place from which the call had been sent in, and thereupon proceeded to Sixth and I Streets, and there arrested the defendant Parkinson and a man by the name of Richie. When questioned at first about the telephone call Parkinson said that it was a joke. After taking Parkinson and Richie to the police station the officers [602]*602went back to Sixth and I Streets, arriving there shortly after 3 o’clock, and found a yellow roadster registered in the name of Parkinson. In this car the police officers found the following articles: sawed-off shotgun, No. 12' gauge; a 30-30 rifle, loaded; a sledge-hammer; a bar; 7 punches; chisel; rope; and a pair of gloves similar to the ones found on the persons of both Crawshaw and Collins.

In making the entrance to the Rainier Distributing Company office it appears that the skylight was opened and a rope was lowered therefrom. This rope was left hanging where 'it had been used in making the entrance to the building. Near the safe where the dial to the combination was broken off was found a piece of a chisel. The piece of the chisel found near the safe fitted into the place where the chisel found in the appellant’s ear had been broken, showing that the chisel found in Parkinson’s car had been used in breaking the combination of the Rainier Distributing Company’s safe. At the police station there was taken from the person of the appellant, a key described by some of the witnesses as a skeleton or pass-key, and by other witnesses, as a common key which was shown by experiments to lock and unlock the door to the office of the Rainier Distributing Company.

The record shows that in addition to the property which we have described as taken from the persons of Crawshaw and Collins, there was taken from the person of Collins a key, a knife and a cheap watch. Experiments made after the close of the trial in this action showed that this key would also unlock and lock the door to the Rainier Distributing Company’s office. The articles which we have mentioned as found in the car belonging to the appellant were contained in a gunnysack.

There is also testimony in the record to the effect that the arresting officers repeatedly asked the appellant about his phone call, and how he knew the two men were arrested, and that the appellant refused to answer; that he simply kept his mouth shut and said nothing; and that he did not tell them that he was phoning for somebody else. Also, at the time that the appellant and Richie were being locked up, the appellant was overheard to say to Richie, “Don’t talk; keep your mouth shut.”

[603]*603In addition to what we have stated as taken from the persons of Crawshaw and Collins, it appears that two loaded shotgun shells No. 12 gauge were taken from the clothing of one of them.

On behalf of the appellant testimony was introduced to the effect that on the evening of October 10, 1933, he went to a place kept by Mr. and Mrs. Wirts at Eighteenth and X Streets, had dinner there, and remained until about 12 o ’clock, when the appellant and Mr. and Mrs. Wirts drove to the north part of the city and stopped at what is called in the record “Richie’s Place”; that they were drinking at the Wirts’ place, and when they went over to Richie’s place they also had several drinks; that they all left the Richie place around about twenty or thirty minutes after 2 A. M.; that they drove from the Richie place down to Sixth and I Streets, and stopped at a speakeasy called the “Green Lantern”; that the appellant and Richie went up there and had a few drinks, the appellant then testifying that he was called out and asked for the loan of his car. The appellant had testified that his car was left parked in the north part of the city near the subway, from early in the evening until the time that he and Mr. Richie left Richie’s place and drove down to the Green Lantern. Just how the appellant’s ear happened to be parked at Richie’s place in the north part of the city, and the appellant had in the evening gone over to a place located in the southern part of the city, is not explained in the record.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
33 P.2d 18, 138 Cal. App. 599, 1934 Cal. App. LEXIS 718, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-parkinson-calctapp-1934.