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sworn to, was originally inserted in the bill, but was struck out during its progress through parliament.

The power heretofore possessed by courts of justice to order the prosecution of any persons committing perjury before them required to be extended, so as to make it effectual to insure the due punishment of such offenders. The 19th clause confers very extensive powers in this respect. It enables

"the judges or judge of any of the superior courts of common law or equity, or any of her Majesty's justices or commissioners of assize, nisi prius, oyer and terminer, or gaol delivery; any justices of the peace, recorder or deputy recorder, chairman or other judge, holding any general or quarter sessions of the peace; any commissioner of bankruptcy or insolvency; any judge or deputy judge of any county court or any court of record; any justices of the peace in special or petty sessions; or any sheriff or his lawful deputy before whom any writ of inquiry or writ of trial from any of the superior courts shall be executed,"

to direct any person to be prosecuted for perjury committed in any evidence or proceeding before them; and to commit him to prison or to take bail for his appearance at the next gaol delivery for the county in which the offence was committed, and to bind over any person to prosecute or give evidence against him at the trial; and to give the party bound to prosecute a certificate of the prosecution being directed by the court, which certificate is to be sufficient evidence of its having been so directed, and on the production of which the court trying the indictment is to allow the costs of the prosecution, unless such court shall otherwise specially direct.

In order to prevent the necessity of producing the record of an indictment upon the trial of which perjury is alleged to have been committed, sect. 22 provides that a certificate containing the substance and effect and omitting the formal part of such indictment, and purporting to be signed by the proper officer of the court, shall be sufficient evidence of the trial of such indictment.

We come next to three clauses referring generally to all indictments, and intended to prevent objections being taken for such defects of form as have hitherto been held fatal. Sect. 23 enacts, that it shall not be necessary to state any venue in the body of an indictment, except where a local description is required to be made, but that the jurisdiction named in the margin is to be taken to be the venue for all facts stated in the indictment; and where an offence is committed in a county of a city or town and is tried in the adjoining county, such county of a city or town

may be stated either in the margin, with or without the name of the county where it is to be tried, or in the body of the indictment, by way of venue.

for

Sect. 24 enacts, that no indictment shall be held insufficient any of the following causes:

For want of the averment of any matter unnecessary to be proved; for the omission of the words "as appears by the record," "with force and arms," "against the peace;" for the insertion of the words "against the form of the statute" instead of "against the form of the statutes," or vice versâ; for describing any person by his name of office or other descriptive appellation instead of his proper name; for omitting to state the time when the offence was committed, where time is not of the essence of the offence (as it is in burglary, night poaching, &c.); for stating the time imperfectly; for stating that the offence was committed on a day subsequent to the finding of the indictment, or on an impossible day (as on the 30th of February), or on a day that never happened (as on the 29th of February, 1851); for want of a proper or perfect venue; for want of a proper or formal conclusion; for want of or imperfection in the addition of any defendant; for want of any statement of the value or price of any matter or thing, or the amount of damage, injury or spoil, in any case where these particulars are not of the essence of the offence. Some of these defects were by a former statute, 7 Geo. IV. c. 64, s. 20, rendered immaterial after verdict; they are now, however, together with some others not formerly cured even after verdict, made utterly immaterial, and cannot be taken advantage of by demurrer or in any other

manner.

Sect. 25 imperatively requires that all objections for formal defects appearing on the face of the indictment shall now be taken by way of demurrer or motion to quash the indictment, before the jury are sworn, and not afterwards, and when such objections are taken, the court may forthwith order the defect to be amended, if necessary, and thereupon the trial is to proceed as if no such defect had appeared. This will practically put an end to all such formal objections being ever taken.

In order to appreciate the full change wrought by this act in criminal pleading, we annex a form of indictment as it may be now framed for larceny by a clerk.

Central Criminal Court, The jurors for our Lady the Queen upon Central Criminal Court, their oath present, that John Styles, three

to wit.

pair of shoes, one coat, and a large sum of money, amounting to £5, of the goods, chattels and monies of the master of the West London Union Workhouse, feloniously did steal, take

and carry away, against the form of the statute in such case made and provided.1

Under this the prisoner may be convicted of three several larcenies within six months, or of three several acts of embezzling any money of whatever denomination, not exceeding in the whole 51., committed against the person who at the time filled the office of master of the workhouse. A clause was inserted in the bill as it originally stood, enabling juries, upon an indictment for larceny, to find a prisoner guilty of obtaining the money or property charged to have been stolen by means of false pretences. This, which would undoubtedly be a great addition to the means already possessed of convicting offenders who are substantially found guilty of crime, was however thought to introduce too great a latitude, and it was feared that accused persons might be prejudiced by so considerable a variance between the offence charged and the offence proved in point of legal phraseology. While we are bound duly to respect this caution, we venture to predict that the success of the present limited experiment in abolishing nominal distinctions will justify its further extension at a future period.

The 25th section has reference to traverses of indictments for misdemeanor, as to which the 60 Geo. III. & 1 Geo. IV. c. 4, provided that such a traverse might be permitted in case the defendant had been committed less than twenty days before the sessions at which the indictment was to be tried. That provision is, however, repealed by the present act, which, in lieu thereof, enacts that,

"No person prosecuted shall be entitled to traverse or postpone the trial of any indictment found against him at any session of the peace, session of oyer and terminer, or session of gaol delivery: provided always, that if the court, upon the application of the person so indicted or otherwise, shall be of opinion that he ought to be allowed a further time, either to prepare for his defence or otherwise, such court may adjourn the trial of such person to the next subsequent session upon such terms as to bail or otherwise as to such court shall seem meet, and may respite the recognizances of the prosecutor and witnesses accordingly, in which case the prosecutor and witnesses shall be bound to attend to prosecute and give evidence at such subsequent session without entering into any fresh recognizance for that purpose.".

This power of postponement will, no doubt, prevent any injustice being done to an accused person by his trial being hurried

Mr. Greaves has suggested that it will be advisable in future to adopt the English idiom of placing the governing verb before the substantive, instead of adhering to the old form, which is literally translated from the Latin, and he has accordingly framed all his precedents in that manner.

VOL. XV. NO. XXIX.

S

on,

while it will obviate the unnecessary expense and delay caused by a traverse as of right under any circumstances. The application for a postponement must, as in ordinary cases, be made after the defendant has pleaded, and courts will probably generally require the grounds of the application to be verified by affidavit.

The next provision is one relating to pleas of autrefois convict or acquit, in which it has hitherto been necessary to set out fully the proceedings upon the former trial. The 28th section of the statute has now dispensed with this formality, and enacts that, "it shall be sufficient for any defendant to state that he has been lawfully convicted or acquitted (as the case may be) of the said offence charged in the indictment." This clause, coupled with that in the Evidence Amendment Act, which we have already noticed, (14 & 15 Vict. c. 99, s. 13) enabling such pleas to be proved by a certificate of the conviction or acquittal, will work a very great improvement in the practice in such cases.

The last enactment in this very valuable statute has reference to the punishment of certain misdemeanors of a graver character than the ordinary class of such offences, and for which the court is upon conviction now enabled to award hard labour during the whole or any part of the term of imprisonment warranted by law. These misdemeanors are enumerated in section 29, and are the following:

Any cheat or fraud punishable at common law.

Any conspiracy to cheat or defraud, or to extort money or goods, or falsely to accuse of any crime, or to obstruct, pervert or defeat the course of public justice.

Any escape or rescue from lawful custody on a criminal charge.

Any public or indecent exposure of the person.

Any indecent assault or assault occasioning a direct bodily
harm.

Any attempt to have carnal knowledge of a girl under
twelve
years of age.

Any public selling or exposing for public sale or to public
view of any obscene book, print, picture or other indecent
exhibition.

The only remaining statute which we propose to include in our present notice, is that which amends the law relating to the expenses of prosecutions and the apprehension and trial of offenders in certain cases (14 & 15 Vict. c. 65). The provisions of this act, although highly important, will not require so lengthened a discussion at our hands as that already given to the two preceding statutes. The 1st section of this act repeals so much of the 7 Geo. IV. c. 64, s. 23, as provides that in cases

of misdemeanor the power given to courts of ordering payment of expenses to prosecutors and witnesses, should not extend to their attendance before the committing magistrate. The effect of this is to place misdemeanors, so far as regards these costs, on the same footing with felonies, in which the attendance before the magistrate was always allowed to the prosecutor. As it is in general equally for the public benefit that offences of all classes should be duly investigated, the removal of this distinction, which frequently operated to deter prosecutors from coming forward and bringing misdemeanors to light, is highly to be commended. Still it is not in all cases of misdemeanor that the power of ordering payment of any expenses exists, and, of course, the attendance before a committing magistrate can only be allowed as part of the general expenses of the prosecution. In addition to certain classes of misdemeanors where such power heretofore existed, the 2nd section of this act confers it in the following cases (whether there be a conviction or not):-abusing girls between the ages of ten and twelve; unlawfully taking any unmarried girl under the age of sixteen out of the possession and against the will of her father or mother or other person having lawful care or charge of her; conspiring to charge any person with felony, or to indict any person of felony, or conspiring to commit any felony. In any of these cases it is now discretionary with the court before which the indictment comes to trial, to allow costs to prosecutors and witnesses as in felonies.

The next section relates to common assaults, in which there has been hitherto no power to allow the expenses of the prosecution. This not unfrequently operated hardly upon those who were bound over by the committing magistrate to appear at the assizes or sessions, because they were thus compelled to expend their time and money for the furtherance of public justice, without being able to claim any remuneration whatever. To remedy this, section 3 provides that wherever justices before whom a case of assault is brought, shall consider it a fit subject for prosecution by indictment, and shall bind the complainant and witnesses in recognizance to prosecute and give evidence at the assizes or sessions of the peace, every such court (i. e. as appears by reference to the preceding recital, the court before whom the indictment is tried) may at its discretion order payment of the costs and expenses of the prosecutor and witnesses so appearing (i.e. appearing at such assizes or sessions) under such recognizance, together with compensation for loss of time and trouble, as in the case of felonies. This clause is not by any means clearly worded, and it may be questioned whether it

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