Does a defendant who takes property for the purpose of claiming a reward have the requisite intent to permanently deprive?

The cases in the second category hold that a defendant who takes property for the purpose of claiming a reward for "finding" it has the requisite intent to permanently deprive. Again the courts invoke differing rationales for this holding. ⁶ One line of these cases is exemplified by Commonwealth v. Mason (1870) 105 Mass. 163. The defendant took possession of a horse that had strayed onto his property, with the intent to conceal it until the owner offered a reward and then to return it and claim the reward, or until the owner was induced to sell it to him for less than its worth. The court affirmed a conviction of larceny on the theory that the requisite felonious intent was shown because the defendant intended to deprive the owner of "a portion of the value of the property." (Id. at p. 168.) The court did not explain this theory further, but later cases suggested that the "portion of the value" in question was the right to claim a reward--ordinarily less than the property's full value--for its return.