1. APPEAL AND ERROR — Briefs — Failure to File. When an appeal is taken to this court from a judgment of conviction in a trial court, counsel, under the rules, are required to brief within 60 days. If no brief is filed, permission is granted to argue the assignments of error orally before this court. In the event no brief is filed and no oral argument offered when the cause is assigned for that purpose, the record will be examined in felony cases for fundamental error, and if none appears, the judgment will be affirmed.
2. SAME — Rehearing — Mandate. When no briefs are filed and no appearances made for oral argument, the plaintiff in error is not entitled to the usual 15 days allowed by the rules of this court for filing petition for rehearing, but the mandate will be ordered forthwith in the discretion of the court, in order that the judgment of the trial court may be properly enforced.
Page 8
Appeal from District Court, Pushmataha County; C.E. Dudley, Judge.
Will Flinchum was convicted of larceny of a domestic animal, and he appeals. Affirmed.
S.E. Welch, for plaintiff in error.
R. McMillan, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
ARMSTRONG, J. The plaintiff in error, Will Flinchum, was convicted in the district court of Pushmataha county, at the November, 1915, term on a charge of larceny of domestic animals, and his punishment fixed at imprisonment in the state penitentiary for a term of three years. The appeal was lodged in this court on May 2, 1916. No briefs have been filed on behalf of the plaintiff in error, and no appearance was made for oral argument when the cause was assigned for argument before this court.
The information charges the plaintiff in error with the larceny of a three year old red steer, the property of Milt Allen. The proof on behalf of the state tends to establish that Flinchum lived near Clayton in Pushmataha county; that on or about the 17th day of August, 1915, he butchered a red steer and sold a portion of the beef in Clayton and the remainder in another small town nearby; that he was not the owner of any cattle within the knowledge of his neighbors, and did not own a red steer answering the description of the one butchered. Milt Allen, who lived in the same section of Pushmataha county, owned a number of cattle, among them the steer in question. The steer was missed from the range, and a diligent search failed to locate him. Information was received that Flinchum had butchered and sold the steer. A deputy sheriff and two or three citizens went to the place of
Page 9
Flinchum and asked to see the hide. Flinchum told them it was in Clayton, and agreed to go with them to see it, but later refused to do so. The officer went to Clayton and found a person who had attempted to buy the hide, but Flinchum had never delivered it to him. The hide was never found. At the home of the plaintiff in error a trunk was found in which considerable hair, answering the description of the hair on the stolen steer, was stuck to the paper inside of the trunk. The odor indicated that the hide had been concealed in the trunk and lately removed. Witnesses who were present and assisted in butchering the steer gave a description of it answering the description of the missing steer of Allen's. No proof was offered by the plaintiff in error.
A careful examination of the record discloses no fundamental error prejudicial to the rights of the plaintiff in error. In fact, the record shows that he had a fair and impartial trial, and was duly convicted according to law.
The judgment of the trial court is affirmed. Mandate ordered forthwith.
DOYLE, P.J., and MATSON, J., concur.