dence does not preclude the State's attorney from presenting the State's evidence to the jury as wholly uncontradicted, where such is the fact and no reference is made to the failure of the accused to testify in his own behalf.

4. SAME what sufficient averment of ownership of building in indictment for arson. In an indictment for arson, if the building was occupied, it is sufficient to allege that it is the property of the owner, lessee or the occupant.

5. SAME when conviction will be sustained though chief witness is an accomplice. A conviction will be sustained even though the chief witness is an accomplice whose conduct and character are such as to discredit him, where his testimony is sufficiently corroborated to warrant the jury in believing him.

WRIT OF ERROR to the Criminal Court of Cook county; the Hon. CHARLES M. WALKER, Judge, presiding.

ARTHUR C. BACHRACH, and FRANCIS J. SULLIVAN, (OSCAR BLUMENTHAL, of counsel,) for plaintiff in error.

P. J. LUCEY, Attorney General, MACLAY HOYNE, State's Attorney, and C. H. LINSCOTT, (FRANK JOHNSTON, JR., and EVERETT JENNINGS, of counsel,) for the People.

Mr. CHIEF JUSTICE CARTWRIGHT delivered the opinion of the court :

The plaintiff in error, Nathan Spira, his brother, Benzoin Spira, David Rice and Max Feilschmidt were indicted in the criminal court of Cook county for arson, in burning, or causing to be burned, on May 7, 1911, a building used and occupied by divers persons for store and factory purposes in the county of Cook, the property of Albert Dickinson. The defendant David Rice could not be found. Max Feilschmidt was not put upon trial and was a witness for the People. The jury found Nathan Spira guilty, and he was sentenced to confinement in the penitentiary for an indeterminate period. Benzoin Spira was acquitted.

Sunday morning, May 7, 1911, at about 1:30 o'clock, the fourth floor of a four-story building owned by Albert

Dickinson, at Nos. 16-22 South Peoria street, was burned, together with a stock of hats, caps and children's dresses, the property of Benzoin Spira, doing business under the name of B. Spira & Co. The stock of merchandise was insured for about $17,000 and about $15,000 was collected. Nathan Spira was not one of the owners of the property nor interested in the business but was an insurance adjuster, and the whole matter of the insurance was turned over to him after the fire. The fire was of incendiary origin, and was started on the third and fourth floors of the building by the use of gasoline, with which the goods on the counters and tables were saturated and which ran off on the floor along the aisles, and burned the floor in streaks at the sides of the tables.

It was satisfactorily proved that the fire was set by Ben Fink, a witness in the case, who was shown by the defendants, in his cross-examination, to have been engaged in the business of setting fires for other persons for as much as three and a half years and had been indicted in a great many cases for setting such fires. He gave a full account of the means by which and the manner in which he set the fire, and the only evidence directly contradicting him was the testimony of three witnesses from Indiana, who said that on the night of May 6, 1911, they played poker for money with him in Brazil, Indiana, from between eight and nine o'clock in the evening until between two and three o'clock in the morning. The jury gave no credit to their statements, and after reading their examination and cross-examination we think the conclusion of the jury was right. Fink had no interest in the business or the property burned and sustained no relation to the owner that would cause him to burn it, and it cannot be doubted that in following the business in which he was engaged he set the fire at the instance of some other person and for some compensation. The question before the jury was whether Nathan Spira and Benzoin Spira were his employ

ers, and the jury found that Nathan Spira was, but that Benzoin Spira, who was at the time in his summer residence at Paw Paw Lake, Michigan, was not.

The facts, according to Fink's testimony, were as follows: He met Nathan Spira in the office of Max Feilschmidt, a fire insurance adjuster, in the Roanoke building, in Chicago, and met him frequently for a number of weeks, until in February, 1911, Nathan Spira asked him to do a job of burning for him, saying that he did not want the fire to originate in his brother's place but on the floor below, to avoid suspicion. Fink agreed to do the job for $400, and Spira said that they would go and look over the premises when the hands were all away, and they went one evening at about 6:30 o'clock and met Benzoin Spira on the fourth floor. It had been agreed that Fink should say he wanted to get children's dresses, and was to look around and see how much gasoline would be needed. He followed the directions and looked around the place and told Nathan Spira that he would need fifty gallons. Nathan Spira told him that his brother was in very bad circumstances and would like to get a fire and pay up his creditors; that he had not got enough insurance and to wait until he had got more insurance, and Fink was to wait for an answer from the insurance company. A week before the fire Nathan Spira told Fink he had got the necessary amount from the insurance company and was ready, and Fink said he had got the gasoline over in his shed and would haul it over three or four days before the fire. Nathan Spira told him he would get a key to the third floor, and the fire should be started on that floor a few minutes ahead of time. On Friday night Fink engaged an expressman named Schneider to haul the gasoline to the premises, and Fink and the defendant David Rice took four ten-gallon cans of gasoline out of Fink's coal shed and the three rode on the wagon to the premises, where they unloaded the gasoline. Nathan Spira was there, and they carried the gaso

line up-stairs to the fourth floor and put it in a big sample trunk about four or five feet wide and seven feet long, and Fink put rags over the cans, and moth balls to cover up the smell of the gasoline. On Saturday afternoon, which was a half-holiday, Fink and Rice went up on the fourth floor. Nathan Spira was present, Benzoin having gone to Paw Paw Lake. Fink and Rice laid out the goods, and put papers, ravelings, linings and other articles along the aisles to keep the gasoline from dripping upon the floor. There was a paper-box factory on the third floor, and Fink scattered clippings from the paper boxes around the elevator on that floor. Fink and Rice remained and played cards until about midnight and then got ready for the fire by pouring gasoline over the goods and on the litter on the third floor. Fink used three fuses,-one on the third floor and two on the fourth,-setting them so that those on the fourth floor would start the fire on that floor about two minutes after it started on the third floor. The fuses were set on fire and then Fink and Rice went out of the window, down the fire-escape and out the rear. After the fire Nathan Spira gave Fink $200, and paid him the balance of $200 about six weeks later, in the office in the Roanoke building.

Max Feilschmidt, whose office was in the Roanoke building, testified that he had been an insurance adjuster for fourteen or fifteen years; that he had known Nathan Spira about twenty years; that Nathan Spira asked him to assist him in getting insurance on his brother's place, because the insurance companies were canceling insurance; that he introduced Nathan Spira to a friend, through whom insurance amounting in the aggregate to about $5000 was obtained; that he had a talk with Nathan Spira in his office about a previous conversation with Fink, in which he upbraided Nathan Spira for not telling him what he intended to do, and told him that Fink had been there and said he was going to have a job in the brother's place; that Nathan

Spira was indignant and called Fink a vile name but asked Feilschmidt to be quiet and be a good fellow, and said that he did not intend to tell Feilschmidt, but if Fink had told him he would not deny it; that Nathan Spira and Fink came up to the office three or four days before the fire and asked him whether he had a friend in the express business; that Fink said he wanted to haul some goods from his office to his new residence; that the witness called up a friend in a neighborhood where there were a lot of expressmen, and Fink afterward said that he got an expressman; that after the fire the expressman was arrested, and Feilschmidt told Nathan Spira of the fact and asked him to pay for his lawyer because he hauled the goods over to the fire, and Nathan Spira said the man got paid for the job and let Fink settle it up; that a couple of months after the fire Nathan Spira brought him $75 for helping him get the insurance, and they had an unfriendly talk, but the witness took the money, as it was all he could get.

Ben Fink, who set the fire, was an accomplice of some other person. He could not gain anything from the commission of the crime unless the benefit came from someone interested in some way in having it committed. The testimony of an accomplice is always acted upon with the greatest caution and is frequently given under the strongest motives to escape punishment and fix the crime upon another. (Hoyt v. People, 140 Ill. 588; Campbell v. People, 159 id. 9; Conley v. People, 170 id. 587; Cochran v. People, 175 id. 28.) A conviction may be had, however, on the uncorroborated testimony of an accomplice if it is of a character to satisfy the jury, beyond a reasonable doubt, of the guilt of the accused. (Honselman v. People, 168 Ill. 172; Kelly v. People, 192 id. 119; People v. Feinberg, 237 id. 348.) The credibility of Fink was affected by the fact that he was a degraded criminal, and also to some extent by a transaction which occurred in the early spring of 1913, while he was in jail in South Bend, Indiana, charged with