Odger's English Common Law

344 LARCENY.
from the owner until a certain event happens (e.g., until he is
paid some money), then the owner has parted with his
possession, and the independent contracting party is in possession
of that chattel. Take, for instance, a bailment. A
bailment exists whenever the owner of goods voluntarily
hands over possession of them to another person, not his
servant, upon a trust or under a contract that the other shall
do something with or to the goods and then return them to
the owner or deliver them to his order; and the person to
whom the goods are entrusted is called a bailee. A married
woman or an infant can be a bailee. 1
Such relations very
frequently occur, e.g., where the owner of goods entrusts them
to a friend for safe keeping, or to a carrier for carriage, or to
a pawnbroker in pawn. If the goods be stolen out of the
possession of the bailee by some third person, either the
bailor or the bailee may be described in the indictment as
their owner. The bailee in such a case has a " special
property " in the goods, and may therefore be described in
the indictment as their owner.
If, however, the goods were taken out of the possession of
the bailee by the bailor himself, it will not of course be
larceny, unless the bailee had a right to retain possession of
them as against the bailor, in which case it will be larceny
and the bailee himself should be described in the indictment
as the owner.
"The expression 'owner' includes any part owner or
person having possession or control of, or a special property
in, anything capable of being stolen." 2
Thus, it is possible for a man to be convicted of stealing his own
property. For example, if A. pawned goods to a pawnbroker and subsequently
stole them without redeeming them, he would be guilty of
larceny ; for they were in the possession of the pawnbroker. Again, if a
man purchased goods on the terms that they were to be paid for on or
before delivery and subsequently contrived to obtain possession of them
surreptitiously without paying for them, he can be indicted for stealing
them from the vendor, although the property in them had passed to
himself. 3 But if the goods, though sold upon such terms, were voluntarily
179.
1 B. v. Jane Bobson (1861), 31 L. J. M. C. 22.
8 S. 1 (2) (iii.)
.
8 B. v. Cohen (1851), 2 Den. C. C. 249 ; B. v. Campbell (1827'). 1 Moo. 0. C.