People v. Peterson

SPENCE, J.

Three persons, James Peterson, Leonard Griggs and Geneva Griggs, were charged in a single information with the crime of burglary. They entered pleas of not guilty and waived a jury trial. At the opening of the trial Leonard Griggs withdrew his plea of not guilty and entered a plea of guilty. The trial before the court thereupon proceeded as to James Peterson and Geneva Griggs and resulted in a finding that both were guilty of second degree burglary. James Peterson, hereinafter referred to as appellant, was sentenced to imprisonment in the county jail for ninety days. He appeals from the judgment of conviction and from the order denying his motion for a new trial.

Appellant’s briefs contain no appropriate headings indicating his contentions on this appeal but in the body of the reply brief he states, “The appeal is based mainly on two

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grounds: Insufficiency of the evidence to support the judgment and errors of the Court in ruling on matters of law and on the introduction of evidence which were highly prejudicial to the defendant.”

The testimony found in the record may be briefly summarized. At about 2 o ’clock on the morning of November 30, 1943, the Arnold Liebes Fur Store on Post Street in San Francisco was entered by breaking a window. Three fur coats and two neck pieces were stolen therefrom. A passing taxi driver heard a noise at the store entrance ‘‘as if something was knocking against the glass” and he returned to the scene of the crime and saw two men and a woman leaving the store. He noticed at the time that the woman was carrying a fur coat and was wearing another coat. He notified a special officer of the American District Telegraph Company who, shortly thereafter, apprehended the woman who was still carrying the fur coat. At the time of her apprehension, the two men were no longer with her. The woman was defendant Geneva Griggs who was found to be wearing another fur coat under her own coat in addition to carrying the fur coat previously mentioned. She then stated that the two coats had been given to her by two men who had obtained them by breaking a window in a fur store. These two fur coats, together with a third fur coat and two neckpieces hereafter mentioned, were identified as the property which had been taken from the Arnold Liebes Fur Store.