29 Fla. 455 | Fla. | 1892
The information is for obtaining property under false pretenses. There was a motion made in the trial court to quash the information, but the motion was overruled, and error has been assigned on this action. The first ground of the motion to be noticed is the one asserting that the information does not show jurisdiction of the court to try the cause. The principle of law relied upon in support of this contention is, that the receipt of money or other property obtained under false pretenses is the consummation of the offense, and the place of its receipt by the offender is the locality of jurisdiction. The receipt or ob baining of the property is the consummation of the offense, and, in the absence of a valid qualifying statute, the place of its receipt is the sole locality of jurisdiction. If the false pretenses are made in one jurisdiction, but the property is obtained in another, the prosecution must, in the absence of such a statute, be instituted in the latter jurisdiction. 7 Am. & Eng. Enc. of Law, 758, 762. In State vs. House, 55 Iowa, 466, where the property alleged to have been fraudulently obtained consisted of promissory notes and a mortgage securing the notes, the false pretenses were made and an agreement of settlement providing for the execution and delivery of the notes and mortgage, was executed in Wright county, and afterwards the notes and mortgage were made and delivered to the defendant in Polk county, where he was
We will defer any consideration of statutory provision, that in all cases where an indictable offense shall be perpetrated in this State, and the same shall commence in any one county and terminate in another, the person offending shall be liable to indictment in either county (sec. 4, p. 446 McClellan’s Digest), and will test the information, upon the point of venue, by the rules of law laid down above.
The allegations of the first count as to obtaining the money, are, substituting figures for words, as follows :
Proceeding how to consider the amenability of the second count to the objection that it does not show
Tt is a settled rule that if the indictment or information is uncertain, or repugnant to itself, as to the county, or other jurisdictional locality, of the commis
In view of what appears in the second count in its averments of the pretences, and preceding what is quoted above, it is impossible to say that the word '‘there,” as used in the quotation, this count refers only to Marion county, or locates the obtaining the money and check in that county. Though at the outset of the count it is alleged that it was in such county the defendants designedly and fraudulently pretended, still such pretending or pretences are charged to have been made to the Land Mortgage Bank of Florida, Limited, of England, and though afterwards, but preceding the above quotation, it is charged that certain false and fraudulent papers were made in Marion county, yet in connection with these allegations the bank, the party alleged to have been defrauded, is again, and more than once, described as “ of England,” and in one place it, in designating a draft or order as one of the false pretences used in obtaining the money or check, is designated as “of England, Jacksonville, Fla.” If it be that the absence of the word “city” before the word “ Jacksonville,” will prevent our taking judicial notice that the city of Jacksonville, in Duval county (a city, we may observe, which is incorporated by special statute, Chapter 3775, approved May
Tested by the rule laid down in the first paragraph of this opinion, neither of the two counts is sufficient, and for the reasons indicated as to each count, yet without saying that the first is not subject also to the criticism made of the second, the information must be quashed, unless the statute first referred to above (sec. 4, p. 446, McClellan’s Digest) will save it. This statute cannot be invoked as aiding a case of this character, unless the information or indictment shows a consummation of the offense in Florida. There, has been no crime committed in Florida, unless the money or the check was obtained here; and this is not shown by either count. If the information duly represented that the things were obtained in Marion county, the information would be good upon its face as against the ob
The information should have been quashed ; and in view of the jurisdictional reasons leading to this conclusion, we cannot be expected to consider the numerous other objections made to the information.
The judgment will be reversed, and the cause remanded with directions to quash the information.