People v. Rhinehart

CASHIN, J.

Appellant Rhinehart, with three others, namely, Haughey, Robinson, and Gleason, was charged by indictment with the crime of conspiracy to commit a series of robberies, and in separate counts with the commission of five offenses of robbery. Appellant and Haughey were found guilty of the conspiracy charged, but as to the remaining charges against the former the jury disagreed. Appellant’s motion for a new trial was denied, from which order and from the judgment he appeals.

Appellant contends that the evidence was insufficient to support the verdict and that the trial court erred in its instructions to the jury.

Two of the persons jointly charged with appellant and who were not tried, namely, Gleason and Robinson, were called as witnesses for the prosecution, and it is urged that they, according to their testimony, being accomplices, were not corroborated as provided by section 1111 of the Penal Code.

The count on which appellant was convicted charged a conspiracy to commit the offenses alleged in the remaining counts of the indictment, and, according to the testimony of the witnesses mentioned, they, with appellant and the fourth defendant, planned and carried out the series of robberies therein charged. Several witnesses testified to a series of robberies, but were unable to identify the appellant

[504]

as one of their assailants, with the exception of the witness Harry Snyder, one of the persons whom appellant was charged with having conspired with his codefendants to rob, who identified both appellant and Robinson as the persons Avho on the date alleged in the indictment robbed the Avitness of a sum of money and other personal property. This testimony established an overt act in which appellant and Robinson Avere actors, tended to establish the fact of a conspiracy between these parties to commit the robbery (12 Cor. Jur., Conspiracy, sec. 229, and cases cited;

People

v.

Bentley,

75 Cal. 407 [17 Pac. 436]), and was sufficient to corroborate the testimony of Robinson