People v. Elliott

The story told by both Errico and the Curtis woman is that on the afternoon of December 27th they were all at the Curtis woman’s flat, and that the defendant left, .saying he was going over to the house to get some pen points and things. Thereafter he came back again with a parcel. They continued to smoke opium, lying on the bed in her room. About 12 o’clock at night .the defendant said it was time to get to work. He and Errico got up and went to work, while the woman stayed in her own room. This parcel was opened, and contained a check book with a number of checks and some pens. With the genuine check, the so-called model which Errico had given to the defendant, he went to work writing signatures on the checks. He kept at it for about two hours and a half. They were finally satisfied with one. Just at this time the ink bottle was upset, and the Curtis woman came out of her room to clean up the ink, and, according to her testimony, she saw Elliott write the last signature, which was pronounced satisfactory. ■ There was discussion between Elliott and Errico as to the amount, and $8,250" was agreed upon. Errico filled in the amount and the number of the check. The signature was made by a rubber stamp impression of the Wood-house Manufacturing Company, and under that stamp Woodhouse’s written signature was put on by Elliott. The check was made out to cash. The next day about 11:30 o’clock Elliott met Errico at the Cur

The present bookkeeper said that on the 28th of December, 1911, he saw the defendant come to the office between 12 and 1. o’clock. He asked if Mr. Woodhouse was in. “I told him he had gone to lunch. He stopped and thought a moment, and then he asked, ‘Could I use your telephone ?’ I said, ‘Yes; there it is, you can use it;’ and -he talked to some one for a few minutes. He called up some one, and was talking, and then he says, ‘What’s the number of this telephone ?’ I told him, and he says, ‘Well, the party I want to talk to is out, so he will call me up here in a few minutes.’ He waited around there for about 10 minutes for the man, and he says, T guess that party ain’t going to call me up. I will come in again and see Mr. Woodhouse.’ That was all, and then he went out.”

The office of the Woodhouse Manufacturing Company is about three short blocks from the Irving National Exchange Bank. Errico presented the check at the bank and received six $1,000 bills, four $500’s and five $50’s, and shortly after coming out of the bank met Elliott who said, “Did you get the money ?” “I says, T did.’ He says, T can’t hardly believe it’ ” And they started in a devious way uptown, first redeeming a ring from a pawnbroker, and then buying a couple of dollars worth of opium. Elliott said, “Now, don’t let nobody touch you for the money on the way up.” Errico handed the money to Elliott, who slipped it into his glove, and they went back to the Curtis flat, whete Elliott gave Errico one $1,000 bill, two $500’s and five $50’s, $2,250 in all. Later that night Elliott told Errico he had given $1,000 to his brother “to hold for me in case both of us drop, and we will have something to fight the case with.” Errico says he got $600 more for the purpose of hiring an expert to fix up the books. Elliott kept the balance. Elliott and his brother insisted that he should take the Curtis woman “lest she should squeal” to Boston, and as a result he did take her to Boston on the 29th, where he laid up at the place indicated by Elliott. There he received letters from Elliott under an assumed name until he was arrested in March. The Curtis woman tells substantially the same story. The evidence is sufficient to require the conviction, if believed. The attempt of the defense was to establish "by cross-examination that this story was concocted for the purpose of ameliorating the punishment that Errico was to receive, or perhaps to secure for him entire immunity by putting the crime on Elliott, and that, as by his own confession Errico had been engaged in these preceding forgeries, this tale of opium smoking and midnight forgery by Elliott, if not the entire product of imagination, is absolutely unbelievable, and that Errico was the sole criminal.

But there were other matters bearing on this count. When he was-arrested the officer said:

“I says, T come here to lock you up.’ He says, ‘What for?’ I says, 'They charge you of acting in concert with Errico, putting over that check for $8,250.’ Q. What did he say to that? A. He says, T did not put it over.’ Well,.I says, ‘They claim you wrote part of it.’ He says, ‘No; Errico wrote-it all.’ ”

There was found on him a couple of little books. In one of them, was the telephone number of the Woodhouse Manufacturing Company. In view of the testimony as to his presence there as a lookout on the day of the perpetration of the crime, that is significant.

[2] The important question is as to the status of Evelyn Curtis.. The defendant claims that she was an accomplice, that the jury should': have been so instructed as matter of law, and that without her testis mony no conviction could be had; it being, of course, admitted that: Errico was an accomplice in the crime of forgery. The court declined, to 'charge that the Curtis woman was or was not an accomplice, but. left it to the jury as a question of fact for them to determine, charging fully as follows:

“The defendant’s counsel claims that the woman Curtis is an accomplice^ * * * One who aids and abets in the commission of crime, one who advises, counsels, procures, or commands another to commit crime, is an accomplice. Now, was that woman an accomplice? Did she aid and abet in. the commission of .this crime? Did she procure the act to be done? Did she advise the act to be done? Did she counsel that to be done? Is there anything in 'this evidence that would bring her within the provisions of section 2 of the Penal Law, as I have read it to you? You let your memories-go over -the evidence from one end to the other. If you find anything in this evidence .that she counseled the drawing of the check, or she advised, it or procured it to be doné, commanded it to be done, why then, of course,, you would be justified in finding that she was an accomplice; but, if you-cannot find any of those elements in it, you could not find she was-an accomplice. She was just merely a witness, in other words, and her testimony-need,not be corroborated if she was a mere witness. It depends upon the imtrinsic credibility of the testimony itself and of the woman herself. Now,, she says that she was called in to wipe up the ink. She admits this illicit-intercourse, etc. She admits the opium on the part of all of .them, said they all smoked it, and they were all lying on her bed, etc., and she said that she-went there and she spoke to the defendant and to Errico, and that neither of them answered what they were to do with the check, and, as she expresses-it, ‘what could she do?’ -The jury might argue to -thémselves, could the woman, have prevented it, could that woman have prevented these men from forging: a check if they wanted to? On the evidence as submitted," could she be made-a party, could she' have been made a defendant, either by her counseling or • active participation in- the act itself, could she have been made a party?If she could have been made a party, she would be an accomplice, and. her-

concerning him is that he knew of the purpose of Zucker, and did not reveal it. Upon this state of facts, the court was asked to charge substantially that Meyers was an accomplice, and for that reason his evidence could not be used to corroborate the evidence of another accomplice, and that it could not be regarded as sufficient to convict unless it was corroborated. This the court refused, and to this refusal, which is how relied upon as error, exception was taken. To constitute • an accomplice one must be so connected with a crime that at common law he might himself have been convicted either as the principal-or as' an accessory before the fact. To warrant -such a conviction, the one accused must have taken part in the perpetration of, or preparation for, the crime, with intent to assist in the crime. Every act which may have a tendency to assist in the perpetration of the crime is not of absolute necessity criminal. Before it will have that effect, it must have" been done with the intention on the part of the actor that it shall aid in the commission of the crime. Unless it appears without dispute that there was such intention, the person doing the act cannot be said to be a principal; and, if there'is a question whether the act was done with such intent, that question must be submitted to the jury and answered by them in ,the affirmative before the actor can be held to be a principal, and consequently before he can be held to be an accomplice. The court was asked to charge that as a matter of law Meyers was an accomplice. That it properly refused to do. Giving to the facts sworn to the largest effect, all that can be said is that the jiiry, upon those facts, might have found that Meyers did -the acts with intent to assist in preparations for the perpetration of that crime, and, if that intent had been found, he could be charged as an accomplice. But it was for the jury to find the intent. The court was not asked to submit to the jury the question whether he was an accomplice, or to say to -the jury that, if they found that he did the acts with intent to assist in -the perpetration of the crime, then he was an accomplice, and required corroboration. Had that request been made, a different question would have been presented. But the court did not err in refusing to decide the effect of those facts as a matter of law, and for that reason it was not error to refuse -to charge as requested.”

In People v. Bright, 203 N. Y. at page 78, 96 N. E. at page 365, Ann. Cas. 1912A, 771, Bartlett, J., writing for a unanimous court, said:

“ ‘To constitute an accomplice, one must be so connected with a crime that at common law he might himself have been convicted either as the principal or as an accessory before the fáct.’ People v. Zucker, 20 App. Div. 363 , 365 [ 46 N. Y. Supp.- 766 , 767], affirmed on opinion below, 154 N. Y. 770 [ 49 N. E. 1102 ], There is no view of the evidence which would have justified the jury of convicting the witness of the crime of which they found the defendant guilty.”

In People v. Elliott, 106 N. Y. 288 , 12 N. E. 602 , the defendant was indicted for the crime of forgery in the second degree, charged as a second offense, in uttering a forged draft purporting to be drawn by a Montreal bank on the National Bank of the Republic of New York." The principal evidence against him at the trial was that of an accomplice, and it is claimed on his behalf that the testimony of the accomplice was not sufficiently corroborated. The General Term held that the testimony of the accomplice was not sufficient corroboration and on that ground reversed the conviction and granted a new trial. The Court of Appeals, Earl, J., writing, reversed, and in regard to evidence that the defendant and the accomplice were acquaintances, and had been seen together in Rochester and other places without explanation of his presence and various slight things of that kind, the court said:

“All these circumstances certainly have some tendency to corroborate the evidence of the accomplice, and they seem to us to satisfy the requirement^ of the section of the Criminal Code referred to. Each circumstance taken by

Itself Is quite inconclusive, but, when considered together, they certainly furnish some corroborative evidence. It" is not necessary that the corroborative evidence of itself should be sufficient to show the commission of the crime, or to connect the defendant with it. It is sufficient if it tends to connect the defendant with the commission of the crime. Nor need the corroborative evidence be wholly inconsistent with the theory of the defendant’s innocence.”

These cases fully sustain the trial court.

[3] A letter was put in evidence, although it is not in the record, claimed to have been written by the defendant and sent to Errico at Boston through one Bechter under an assumed name. There was evidence showing an acquaintance with one Johnny Bechter, and the defendant Errico testified that that letter was in the handwriting of the defendant. The appellant makes a point on the admission of that letter, but Errico qualified fully as to knowledge of his handwriting. The rule in regard to corroboration does not attach to each and every part of the material evidence given by the accomplice. If so, there would be no necessity for using the accomplice because all the facts would have to be sufficiently proved without him. All the corroboration that is required is testimony tending to show the connection of the defendant with the crime. People v. Everhardt, 104 N. Y. 591 , 11 N. E 62 . The letter was properly admitted in evidence.

All the other matters pressed upon our attention have been carefully considered, but none are serious enough to require discussion.

On both counts there was legal evidence sufficient to justify the verdict, and no errors were committed which would warrant reversal.

The judgment should be affirmed. All concur.