People v. Powers

208 Ill. App. 532, 1917 Ill. App. LEXIS 907
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedOctober 16, 1917
DocketGen. No. 6,407
StatusPublished

This text of 208 Ill. App. 532 (People v. Powers) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Powers, 208 Ill. App. 532, 1917 Ill. App. LEXIS 907 (Ill. Ct. App. 1917).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Dibell

delivered the opinion of the court.

An information containing eight counts was filed against George P. Powers in the County Court of Boone county and he was tried and convicted under the first and eighth counts, and we reversed that judgment and remanded the canse in People v. Powers, 200 Ill. App. 536, where the facts as they then appeared to the court were stated. After the cause was reinstated in the trial court, the State’s Attorney, by leave of court, filed an amended first count, and the cause*, was tried upon the amended first count and the eighth count, and defendant was acquitted under the amended first count and convicted under the eighth count. The latter was a nuisance count and there was a judgment of fine and imprisonment and abatement of the nuisance until the statutory bond should be given. Defendant seeks a review of that judgment.

Defendant pleaded the general issue and certain special pleas. The special pleas were stricken from the files. They were not dilatory pleas and they were therefore unnecessary under Hankins v. People, 106 Ill. 628; and People v. Brady, 272 Ill. 401.

Our former reversal was based on the ground that the evidence was insufficient to justify a verdict that Powers was the keeper of the place, 423 South State street in the City of Belvidere, specified in the eighth count. The main contention of defendant here now is that the evidence at this trial on that subject is substantially the same as on the former trial and therefore we must adhere to our former decision and reverse the judgment. To show us what the evidence was in the former trial, defendant has filed copies of the abstract in the former case. The People argue that as there was no proof made in the court below what the evidence was in the former trial and as the record of the court below in this case does not show what that former evidence was, this abstract is not subject to our inspection and we cannot judicially know what that evidence was. There are many cases in the Supreme and Appellate Courts where it is held that if the evidence in the record brought to a court of review upon the second appeal or writ of error is the same as at the first review of the ease, the parties are bound by the conclusion of the court on the facts on the first review. Most of these cases, however, do not disclose the means by which the reviewing court ascertained whether the evidence was substantially the same in both cases. Some of the cases show that the reviewing court resorted to its former opinion to ascertain the facts.- Such appears to have been the case in Taylor v. Frew, 113 Ill. 358; In re Estate of Maher, 210 Ill. 160, on page 165, and Hemenway v. Thompson, 227 Ill. 146. Other cases indicate that the reviewing court resorted to the record before it on the former review. Among these are Rising v. Carr, 70 Ill. 596; Smyth v. Neff, 123 Ill. 310; Chicago & A. R. Co. v. Kelly, 182 Ill. 267, and People v. Carr, 265 Ill. 220. In the latter case the question was whether the County Court in that case could take judicial notice of its records in certain other cases previously before it. It was held that although the former cases were between the same parties and involved the same subject-matter, yet they were not the same proceeding and hence the County Court, could not take notice of its own records in those cases. The court there said: “A court wUl take judicial notice of its own records and thus dispense with proof identifying such records, but it will not take judicial notice of the contents of any of its records except the one in the proceeding before it.” The implication is that if it had been the same proceeding the County Court should have taken judicial notice of its former record. The same question has been before the Appellate Courts. In World’s Columbian Exposition Co. v. Lehigh, 94 Ill. App. 433, the court held: “Both appeals being between the same parties and in the same suit, we can take judicial notice of the record in the former appeal,, and if the fáets on the former trial were the same as on the second trial, which resulted in the judgment from which the present appeal is taken, we are concluded by the adjudication of the court in the former appeal.” The court evidently examined its former record in Middeke v. Balder, 98 Ill. App. 525, and Illinois Cent. R. Co. v. Seitz, 111 Ill. App. 242. We therefore conclude that to determine whether the evidence is the same in the present.record as in the record when the same case was formerly before us, we may properly examine both our opinions and the former record remaining in this court. If so, we may examine the former abstract as a convenient method of getting at the contents of the former record.

In our view there is new and important evidence in this record. The City of Belvidere became anti-saloon territory on May 7, 1914. The information in this case was filed on October 28, 1915. One item of new evidence in the present record is proof that in July, 1914, Powers took out a federal license as a retail liquor dealer for the year beginning July 1, 1914, and expiring June 30, 1915, thus covering a large portion of the time to which the other proof relates. It did not name No. 423 South State street, or give any other street number, but gave the place of business as Belvidere, Illinois. Defendant gave his reason for procuring that license, which, of course, could not be directly contradicted, and argues here that that reason must be accepted as the true one. He stated that he had in his cellar at home some cider which he was afraid would get hard and he wanted to sell it, and he did not know but what he might go into the cider business further, and so to protect himself against the federal statute he procured this license as a retail liquor dealer, and hung it up in his cellar. On cross-examination he stated that he had half a dozen barrels of cider in his cellar, and then that he had five. The cross-examiner then assumed in a question that he had ten barrels of cider and he did not contradict that. He testified that he afterwards sold' part of it and that he did not sell it at retail nor in his cellar. He was entirely unable to tell to whom he sold it or how he sold it. «The jury might very well have concluded either that he had no such cider in his cellar or that it was in fact sold at 423 South State street. At the front door at that place was the sign, “Q-. P. Powers, Buffet,” and his name also appeared on the side door of that building on another street. If the federal government had accused Clark of selling intoxicating liquors at that place without a government license, this license held by Powers could very easily have been used to protect sales at 423 South State street. Moreover, he paid $25 for that license, and the jury might well doubt whether defendant would pay that sum to protect himself in the sale of some portion of five barrels of cider.

In the former record Powers was cross-examined as to a conversation with the mayor, but the mayor was not a witness. At the last trial the mayor was a witness and testified to two conversations with Powers, one about April 30, 1915, and the other in the following June. The tenor of the conversations was that Powers sought to have the mayor and police not interfere with his keeping the place at 423 South State street, and in those conversations Powers spoke of the. property and the business carried on there and the receipts he hoped to derive from it as being his own.

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Related

Rising v. Carr
70 Ill. 596 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1873)
Hankins v. People
106 Ill. 628 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1883)
Taylor v. Frew
113 Ill. 358 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1885)
Smyth v. Neff
17 N.E. 702 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1888)
Chicago & Alton Railroad Co. v. Kelly
54 N.E. 979 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1899)
In re Estate of Maher
71 N.E. 438 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1904)
Hemenway v. Thompson
81 N.E. 52 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1907)
People ex rel. Zilm v. Carr
106 N.E. 801 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1914)
People v. Brady
272 Ill. 401 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1916)
World's Columbian Exposition Co. v. Lehigh
94 Ill. App. 433 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1901)
Middeke v. Balder
98 Ill. App. 525 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1901)
Illinois Central Railroad v. Seitz
111 Ill. App. 242 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1903)
People v. Powers
200 Ill. App. 536 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1916)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
208 Ill. App. 532, 1917 Ill. App. LEXIS 907, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-powers-illappct-1917.