Walker v. State

Citations

• 68 Fla. 278

Syllabus

<p>False Pretenses — Representations in Reference to Number of Acres in Tract of Land Sold.</p> <p>i. Where the defendant obtains from the prosecutor an automobile in exchange for $150 in cash and a deed to a lot of land that he represented to contain ten acres, after having shown the land to the prosecutor and pointed out to him its true boundaries, and the prosecutor about six months after receiving his deed, lias tlie land surveyed and then discovers that it contains only five acres, and there is no evidence of any effort or intention on the defendant’s part to wilfully deceive the prosecutor or to defraud him in the transaction, except the bare expression of his opinion that there was ten acres in the tract, or that there were five acres cleared and five acres in woodland, which assertion, if it was false, must have been perfectly apparent to the prosecutor when he had the boundaries truly pointed out to him, and walked all over it with the defendant, this does not constitute such a false pretense for which the defendant can in law be held criminally liable.</p> <p>'¿. It is well settled that an expression of a false opinion or judgment is not within the statute.</p> <p>3. Where the xiretense relied uxion to support the crime is absurd or irrational, or such as the party injured had at hand at the very time the means of detecting, it does not constitute a criminal offense.</p>