221 A.D. 315 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1927
The appellant has been convicted of grand larceny in the first degree. The facts out of which the crime arose may be briefly stated.
" During the month of August, 1921, Dillon & Co., a brokerage
It is undisputed that the appellant, Philip Kastel, was in control of Dillon & Co.; and it is well established by the evidence that he received the avails of this money, intrusted to this concern for the specified purpose of purchasing stock. These acts clearly constituted the crime of larceny. (People v. Meadows, 199 N. Y. 1; People v. Laurence, 137 id. 517.)
The only question here requiring consideration is that of jurisdiction. In People v. Toohill (208 App. Div. 174), a companion case tried under the same indictment, we held by implication that there was jurisdiction of the crime in Montgomery county, although the judgment of conviction was reversed for error in the admission of evidence. We may now definitely determine the question of jurisdiction.
It is argued here that because the wrongful appropriation of the funds occurred in the county of New York, the crime was exclusively indictable and triable there. We cannot take that view of it. Section 134 of the Code of Criminal Procedure provides: “ When a crime is.committed, partly in one county and partly in another, or the acts or effects thereof, constituting or requisite to the consummation of the offense, occur in two or more counties, the jurisdiction is in either county.”
The evidence justifies a finding that there was a concerted plan that Shaul should be induced to part with his money by artifice or false representations made in the county of his residence, with no purpose of actually purchasing stock with the funds so obtained. Kastel may not have known originally of this particular transaction, but it was arranged by his agents under the general plan he had formulated for doing business, and he became familiar with it and had opportunity to carry out the purchase in good faith. Instead he appropriated the money to his own use, and decamped when bankruptcy and other troubles impended. He thus adopted the
No longer is it the policy of the law to permit those obviously guilty of criminal acts to escape punishment through highly technical questions of jurisdiction. The defendant selected his field of operations. He has had a fair trial in the county where the crime originated.
The judgment of conviction should be affirmed.
Cochrane, P. J., Hinman, McCann and Whitmyer, JJ., concur.
Judgment of conviction affirmed.