People v. Peniston

[721]

FLEMING, J.

Appeal from a conviction for extortion (Pen. Code, § 518) and for attempted extortion (Pen. Code, §524).

Everett Peniston, the defendant, is a chief petty officer in the Navy. He met the complaining witness, Anne Shores, in August 1962, in a bar where she was a cocktail waitress. The following morning Peniston left on a Navy cruise. During this trip a torrid correspondence began, and Mrs. Shores sent him partially-nude photographs of herself. When he returned home, she gave him more pictures, 10 in all, and they began living together. Five weeks later they ceased living together but continued casual sexual relations until Peniston left for the Far East in February 1963. Although Mrs. Shores had a child, allegedly Peniston’s, in August 1963, she began living with Mr. Shores as his wife in September 1963. When Peniston returned in November 1963, Mrs. Shores testified, ‘ ‘ He told me he was going to buy into [a bar] and he needed [$400], and he wanted me to give it to him and if I didn’t he would take the pictures to my husband and to my parents.” Mrs. Shores testified she gave Peniston the money and then did not hear from him until February 1964. At that time she asked him to return the pictures. He told her he wanted $10,000 for them, but they finally agreed on a price of $1,000. On the evening of February 14 Peniston gave her the pictures, she gave him an envelope prepared by the police, and he was arrested as he stepped from the car. At the time of the arrest a friend of Peniston was parked in a nearby alley in an automobile with lights off and motor running. The friend attempted to back out of the alley but was stopped by the police.

The defense was based on the proverb “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” Peniston testified he stopped living with Mrs. Shores in December 1962, after she told him she had been arrested for prostitution and she had venereal disease. After he left in February 1963 she continued to write him. When he returned she constantly tried to get in touch with him but he ignored her calls and messages because he would not go out with a married woman. Peniston denied any extortion, denied he had ever asked her for money, and denied he had threatened to disclose the existence of the pictures. He did testify that in February 1964 Mrs. Shores had volunteered to lend him the money to make a down payment on an automobile and had asked for the return of the photographs in order to make copies of them. Character witnesses testified Peniston’s reputation for truth and honesty was good and Mrs. Shores’