State v. Genova
State v. Genova
Opinion of the Court
The defendant was presented for the violation of General Statutes, § 8675, which forbids policy playing. He was found guilty in a trial to the court and has appealed. He claims that the court erred in finding him guilty when the evidence did not establish his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, in certain conclusions of facts, and in a ruling on the admission of testimony.
The information accused the defendant of policy playing and charged that he “did engage in the sale or exchange of policy slips or tickets, for the purposes of wagers and gambling, against the peace and contrary to the form of the statute in such case made and provided.” He concedes that the information was, “on its face, good and sufficient.” He argues, however, that the statute describes with great particularity what acts or series of acts shall constitute a violation of it. He claims that there was not sufficient evidence, or, indeed, any evidence, of “any sale or exchange whatsoever of any policy slips by the defendant or by anyone else.” The portion of the statute pertinent to the disposition of these claims is as follows: “Any person . . . who . . . shall write, sell, bargain, exchange, give, transfer, deliver, buy, collect or receive, or be concerned in writing, selling, bargaining, exchanging, giving, transferring, delivering or receiving, any policy slips, tickets, tokens, numbers or chances, used in said game of chance, business, scheme or occupation,
The defendant did not himself testify or offer any other evidence. The following facts could reasonably have been found: In the game of policy, the player selects a combination of three digits upon which he bets his money, from one penny up. He transmits these numbers by telephone or otherwise to the one taking the bet, who records them, together •with the amount placed. The winning combination is determined by taking the last whole number in the winnings of the first three horse races at some race track — in this instance, Hialeah, Florida — as the first digit, the last whole number in the winnings of the first five races as the second digit, and the last whole number in the winnings of the first seven races as the third digit. The one making the wager can cheek the success of his bet from the horse-racing reports carried daily in a well-known New York newspaper.
On January 12,1953, shortly after 1 o’clock in the afternoon, Lieutenant IXalpin of the Bridgeport police department and Detectives Ford, Witt and Beardsworth went to a two-family house at 192 Harriet Street in Bridgeport. They had a search and seizure warrant. Ford, Witt and Beardsworth entered the ground-floor apartment by a rear door which opened into the kitchen. Halpin entered the living room through the front door. He found the defendant watching television. He and the defendant went into the kitchen, where they joined the three detectives. Meantime, in a bedroom adjoining the kitchen, the detectives had discovered the defendant’s wife seated at a desk on which there were
The evidence did not establish that the defendant had personally sold or exchanged any ticket or policy slip in the sense of making an actual transfer of some tangible article. But proof of the sale and actual transfer of a policy slip or ticket as a record of a bet to the one placing it was not necessary. The information charged that the defendant “did engage in the sale or exchange of policy slips or tickets.” The wording of the statute is sufficiently broad to encompass not only the actual act of selling or exchanging some tangible object in the form of a slip or a ticket but also being “concerned” with selling or exchanging it. See State v. Mola, 128 Conn. 407, 409, 23 A.2d 126. One is concerned in a certain matter when he has some connection with it. when it affects his interests or involves him. Then, too, one is “engaged” in an affair when he is
The defendant admitted to the police that he owned the papers which were identified as policy slips. This fact, together with the further fact that these slips were actually records of bets obviously taken by the defendant’s wife over the telephone, while the defendant was in an adjoining room, at a time of day, before the races, when such bets would ordinarily be recorded, justified an inference that the defendant, acting through his runners, had been engaged in selling policy slips or their equivalent to others. The evidence was sufficient to indicate to a reasonable person such a strong probability of the defendant’s concern or engagement in the taking of the bets that an explanation or denial could reasonably be expected. It was sufficient to make out a prima facie case which a court would be warranted
The defendant assigns error in the admission of testimony from a police lieutenant that certain papers seized when the defendant was taken into custody and which he admitted belonged to him were policy slips. The matter was one calling for the testimony of a qualified expert, and the evidence was properly admitted. Temple v. Gilbert, 86 Conn. 335, 344, 85 A. 380.
There is no error.
In this opinion Inglis, C. J., Wynne and Daly, Js., concurred.
Dissenting Opinion
(dissenting). The information charged the defendant with a violation of § 8675 of the General Statutes in that on January 12, 1953, at Bridgeport, he engaged in the sale or exchange of policy slips or tickets, for the purpose of wagers and gambling. On its face this stated a good charge. The flaw in the court’s judgment, however, is that, regardless of what other violations of the statute the defendant may have committed, the state did not establish the one of which it sought to prove him guilty.
Section 8675
An essential element of the crime, then, which the state had to establish beyond a reasonable doubt, if a legal conviction was to follow, was the sale or exchange of policy slips or tickets on the part of the defendant. At the time of the search of the defendant’s home, the police found, near a telephone, several large sheets of paper upon each of which was recorded a long list of wagers. Calling an elephant a giraffe will not make it one, and calling these sheets of paper policy slips or tickets, as the state’s attorney insists on doing, is merely indulging in an attempt at semantic legerdemain and is futile as a method of altering what the sheets actually are, namely, records of bets, and, in all probability, bets taken over the telephone. But the state’s attorney finds it essential to maintain the position he has taken. He conceded, during oral argument, that unless the sheets were policy slips or tickets his ease against the defendant would collapse, since there was no proof, direct or by inference, of the existence of any other slips or tickets or of their sale or exchange.
My colleagues escape from this dilemma by observing that the defendant admitted to the police his
Because of this, my colleagues have gone far afield, it seems to me, and, indeed, contrary to the conceded state of the evidence, by interjecting into the opinion the statement that the defendant, “acting through his runners, had been engaged in selling policy slips or their equivalent to others.” Just what the majority mean by the words “their equivalent” is left obscure. The statute certainly makes no reference to them. But that aside, there is not a scrap of evidence on the part of anyone that the defendant had “runners” or that either he or they sold or exchanged slips or tickets. I find myself in complete discord with the opinion and the basis upon which the conviction is sustained. As I view the case, it is far more important to preserve the requirements of proof required in criminal matters than to hold this particular defendant guilty upon the evidence presented in this record. See State v. Skinner, 132 Conn. 163, 168, 43 A.2d 76.
"See. 8675. policy playing; gaming by use op lottery slips or tickets. Any person, whether a principal, agent or servant, who
Reference
- Full Case Name
- State of Connecticut v. Peter Genova
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- 25 cases
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- Published