receiver of stolen goods

RECEIVER OF STOLEN GOODS, crim. law. By statutory provision the receiver of 
stolen goods knowing them to have been stolen may be punished as the 
principal in perhaps all the United States. 
     2. To make this offence complete, the goods received must have been 
stolen, and the receiver must know that fact. 
     3. It is almost always difficult to prove guilty knowledge; and that 
must in general be collected from circumstances. If such circumstances are 
proved which to a person of common understanding and prudence and situated 
as the prisoner was, must have satisfied him that they were stolen, this is 
sufficient. For example, the receipt of watches, jewelry, large quantities 
of money, bundles of clothes of various kinds, or personal property of any 
sort, to a considerable value, from boys or persons destitute of property, 
and without any lawful means of acquiring them and specially if bought at 
untimely hours, the mind can arrive at no other conclusion than that they 
were stolen. This is further confirmed if they have been bought at an 
undervalue, concealed, the marks defaced, and falsehood resorted to in 
accounting for the possession of them. Alison's Cr. Law, 330; 2 Russ. Cr. 
253; 2 Chit. Cr. Law, 951; Roscoe, Cr. Ev. h.t.; 1 Wheel. C. C. 202. 
     4. At common law receiving, stolen goods, knowing them to have been 
stolen, is a misdemeanor. 2 Russ. Cr. 253.