Messner v. Board of Dental Examiners

FINCH, P. J.

This is an original application for a writ of review by which petitioner seeks to have annulled an order of respondent Board, hereinafter referred to as respondent, suspending his license to practice dentistry for a period of ten years.

The accusation upon which he was tried alleges that on or about March 25, 1927, he “did wilfully and unlawfully aid and abet an unlicensed person, to-wit: W. M. Cohn, to practice dentistry, ... in that the said Karl W. Messner did then and there practice dentistry in an office managed and conducted by the said W. M. Cohn,- that the said Karl W. Messner at this said time well knew that the said office was a place where dental operations were performed and . . . that the said W. M. Cohn was the manager thereof and that the said W. M. Cohn was participating in the profits with Ralph Mitchell and others as the proprietor thereof.”

One of respondent’s inspectors testified that on March 26, 1927, he visited the office “conducted by Dr. Ralph Mitchell and known as ‘Dr. Mitchell and Associated Dentists,’ at 706 South Broadway in the city of Los Angeles”; that a woman at the information desk informed him that Cohn was manager, but that both Mitchell and Cohn were then absent, and referred him to a woman at another desk, Miss Olson; that Miss Olson' also informed him that Cohn was manager and made out and gave the witness a written list of the employees, in which she inserted “Mr. W. M. Cohn, Manager” and “Dr. Ralph Mitchell, Employer”; that he did not suggest to Miss Olson that she enter Cohn’s name as manager, but “told her to put it exactly as the record showed, the time card.” The witness was cross-examined by the accused, who was not represented by counsel, as follows : “ Q. Do you remember when I called you up about the paper? A. I don’t remember who it was; somebody called me up . . . and said it was Dr. Mitchell’s office and said that the girl had no authority to sign that, that Cohn was not the manager and to return the paper.”

[202]

Miss Olson, as a witness for the prosecution, testified that she was cashier of the office, and that at the time alleged in the accusation Cohn was bookkeeper, “superintendent of lab and to prepare the advertising”; that his duty as superintendent of the laboratory was “to see that the work went out on time”; that “all that he .did was to attend to the advertising and to keep the books and . . . superintend the laboratory”; that he sometimes signed cheeks; that “he received dividends”; that Dr. Mitchell signed the dividend checks; that Cohn “was interested the same as the rest of the doctors”; that he purchased supplies for the office; that the receipts of the office were deposited in the bank in the name of “Dr. Ralph Mitchell, trustee”; that she never believed that Cohn was manager, but that Dr. Mitchell was manager”; that she inserted Cohn’s name as manager- because the inspector told her to do so; that she wanted to put him down as advertising manager and he (the inspector) said ‘No, that covers everything, and so put him down as manager,’ instead of writing it all out it covered that”; that Cohn “had money in the trust the same as the rest of them.”