People v. Leonard

Garoutte, J. This is an appeal by the people from an order of the superior court sustaining defendant’s demurrer to the indictment. The indictment charged that the defendant was a director, officer, manager, and servant of the Bank of Santa Clara County, a corporation, etc., and as such officer, etc., “there then and there came, and was under his control and possession, a certain record known as a ‘ note register,’ which said record was then and there the property of and kept by the said corporation, and the said H. M. Leonard, while said record was so in his possession and under his control, by virtue of his trust as such director, etc., then and there, to wit, on the thirty-first day of October, 1892, with intent in him, the said H. M. Leonard, to defraud the said corporation in the sum of three thousand dollars, did will[202]fully, unlawfully, and feloniously make in the said record the following false entries, to wit:

Section 563 of the Penal Code provides: “Every director, officer, or agent of any corporation .... who, with intent to defraud, .... makes any false entries in any book of accounts or other record or document kept by such corporation or association, is punishable by imprisonment in the state prison not less than three nor more than ten years.” .... The indictment in this case was framed under the foregoing section, and we see no objection that can be made to it. It is urged by respondent that nothing is shown by its face indicating wherein the entry is false. There is no merit in this contention, for the indictment sets out in haec verba the entries made by the defendant, and alleges that they were false entries. If they were false, that is, unauthorized by any existing facts, then they were each and all false, and the allegation is exactly in line with the statute. It is claimed that, conceding the entry to be false, still it was not such an entry as could result in defrauding the bank. The indictment clearly shows that no honest man guided the pen that made these entries. They were made through no mistake of fact. They were not only false, but criminally false, for they were made with intent to defraud. It is not necessary to set out how these entries could have resulted in defrauding the bank. That is purely a matter of evidence. In all penal statutes, where the offense is one requiring the act to be done with a certain intention, as burglary, forgery, and obtaining property by false pretenses, it is only necessary in the accusing paper to set out what the defendant actually did, and that he did it with a certain intent. It is not necessary, therefore, to state facts showing how he could have successfully carried out his nefarious schemes and intentions of defrauding some one. If those mat