World v. State

Grason, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The appellant was indicted in the Criminal Court of Baltimore on the 30th day of November, 1877, and the indictment contained two counts; the first charging that the appellant was a “a common thief” on the 17th day of November, 1877, and the second, that be was a “common thief” at said city on the 17th day of November, 1876, and from that day to the day of finding the indictment. At the trial, the State offered in evidence a record of the conviction of the appellant in said Court on the 8th day of March, 1877, of the larceny of a silver watch and also the record of his conviction in the same Court on the 20th day of October, 1875, of having jointly with two other parties, won a watch by a fraudulent trick at cards. The appellant, by his counsel, objected to the admissibility of these two records as evidence, but the Court overruled the objection and admitted the evidence, and the appellant excepted.

The State then proved by a police officer, the only witness who testified in the case, that the appellant had fori merly lived in his police district, and that the witness had known him from 1869 until he left witness’ district about a year or eighteen months before the trial, when witness, had lost sight of him and knew nothing of his reputation since; but that while he knew him his reputation and character was that of a common thief. This evidence was also objected to as inadmissible, but the objection was overruled and the evidence admitted, and an exception thereto was taken by the counsel of the accused. The Act of Assembly, under which the appellant was indicted, provides that “ any evidence of -facts or reputation, proving that such person is habitually and by practice a thief, shall be sufficient for his conviction, if satisfactorily establishing the fact.” In order to justify a conviction of a party of the offence created by the Act there must be proof of either facts, or reputation, sufficient to satisfy the jury that the party accused is by practice and ⁵⁵ habit a thief. The offence is hut a misdemeanor, and it must therefore he jjrosecuted within one year from the time of its commission.

It is necessary, in order to justify a conviction, that the proof should establish the fact that the accused was a “common thief” within one year before the prosecution was begun, and therefore evidence of acts of larceny, committed more than a year before the indictment was found, would not be admissible. Though the conviction of the accused of the larceny of a watch was within a year before this prosecution was begun, it was contended that standing alone, it was not sufficient to prove that the accused was by habit and practice a thief, and that it was not admissible unless connected with an offer to follow it up with other proof to the same point, and that, as no such offer was made, the Criminal Court erred in admitting it. It did not matter that the record of the conviction of the accused, of larceny in 1817,