15 R. 2. c. 3. 33 H. 8. c. 12. verge. defendant, her captain, for refusing the county coroner and his jury admission into the ship; though the admiralty insisted that they had a coroner of their own, but without shewing that he had previously taken inquisition. The court noticed that, as they did not pretend their coroner ever took inquisitions, so it was contended that none should be taken. And though there have been variety of opinions as to the admiralty jurisdiction, yet it was never carried farther than a pretence to a concurrent jurisdiction. R. v. Solgard, 2 Stra. 1097. Andrews, 231. S. C.; and see 4 Inst. 141. 28 H.8. c. 15. post, Vol. III. (Criminal Law,) tit. Admiralty Court. The jurisdiction of the admiralty coroner in cases of "deaths done in great ships hovering in the main streams of great rivers, below the bridges of the same rivers, nigh to the sea," under stat. 15 R.2. c. 3., is not exclusive of the county coroner's jurisdiction in rivers where a man can see from one side to the other, 1 Hale, 54.; or at least where a man standing on the one side of the land may see what is done on the other. Haw. b. 2. c. 9. East, P.C.c. 17. §10. post, Vol. III. (Criminal Law), tit. Admiralty Court. But at least, adds Sir E. H. East, where there is any doubt, the jurisdiction of the common law ought to be preferred. Inquisitions before the admiralty coroner are returned to the commissioners upon stat. 28 H. 8. c. 15.; those before the county coroner are returned before the commissioners of gaol delivery for the county. 2 Hale, 54. 1 & 2 P. & M. c. 13. § 5., post, p. 760. By stat. 33 H. 8. c. 12., the coroner of the king's house, usually Coroner of the called the coroner of the verge, is appointed by the lord steward or lord great master of the king's house for the time being, and since stat. Articuli super Cartas, 28 Ed. 1. c. 3., in inquisition to be taken of the death of a man, the coroner of the county shall join with the coroner of the king's house; and if it happen it cannot be determined before the steward, process shall be thereupon had at common law. Murder or manslaughter in H. M.'s palace. In boroughs. But yet in that case of death within the verge, the coroner of the county cannot take an inquisition without the coroner of the verge; and if he doth, it is void: but if one person be coroner of the county and also of the verge, the inquisition before him is as good as if the offices had been in several persons, and taken by both, 2 Hale, 55.; and though the court remove, yet he may proceed upon that inquisition as coroner of the county. Wigg's case, 4 Rep. 45, 46. But if a murder or manslaughter be done within the precincts of the king's palace, limited by stat. 33 H. 8. c. 12., then by that statute the inquisition shall be taken by the coroner of the household without the adjoining or assisting of any coroner of any county by 12 or more of the yeomen, officers of H. M.'s household. And this shall be as sufficient as if taken also by the coroner of the county, and the method of the return and proceeding upon those inquisitions before the lord steward is therein declared and enacted. [As to the appointment of coroners in boroughs, see tit. Corporations.] III. His power and Duty in taking an Inquisition of Death. When it happens that any person comes to an unnatural death, Notice. the township shall give notice thereof to the coroner. Otherwise, if the body be interred before he come, the township shall be amerced. 4 MS. Sum. 333. And by Holt C. J., it is a matter indictable to bury a man that Burying withdies a violent death, before the coroner's inquest have sat upon out notice. him. Id. If the township shall suffer the body to lie till putrefaction, without sending for him, they shall be amerced. Id. When notice is given to the coroner, he is to issue a precept to the constable of the four, five, or six next townships to return a competent number of good and lawful men of their townships, to appear before him in such a place to make an inquisition touching that matter. Or he may send his precept to the constable of the hundred. 2 Hale, 59. 4 Edw. 1. st. 2. Wood's Inst. b. 4. c. 1. Lying un buried. Precept to sum mon a jury. If the constables make not a return, or the jurors returned Default in not appear not, their defaults are to be returned to the coroner; and appearing. the constables or jurors in default shall be amerced before the judge of assize. 2 Hale, 59. The jury appearing is to be sworn and charged by the coroner Swearing and to inquire, upon the view of the body, how the party came by charge. his death. 2 Hale, 60. body. For he can take inquisition of death only upon view of the body, Necessity of a and not otherwise; therefore, if the body be interred before he view of the come, he must dig it up. And this he may do lawfully within any convenient time, as in fourteen days. 2 Haw. c. 9. § 23. 4 MS. Sum. 333. 1 Saund. 363. note 1. And, in a recent case, it was expressly decided by the court of K. B. that a coroner can only take an inquest super visum corporis; and that an inquest in which the jury were not sworn by the coroner himself, and super visum corporis, is absolutely void. The court, therefore, after an adjournment by the coroner of such an inquest, refused to grant any mandamus to compel him to proceed in it. R. v. Ferrand, M. 60 G. 3., 3 B. & A. 260. But it is not necessary that the inquisition be taken in the very Adjourning same place where the body was viewed; but they may adjourn to after view. a place more convenient. 2 Haw. c. 9. § 25. If the body cannot be viewed, the coroner can do nothing; but the justices of the peace shall inquire thereof. 4 MS. Sum. 334. Where the body cannot be viewed. The jury being sworn, and the body upon view, he shall inquire 4 E. 1. st. 2. upon the oaths of them, in this manner, by the statute of 4 E. 1. st. 2., called the statute de officio coronatoris: viz. If they know where the person was slain; whether it were in any house, field, bed, tavern, or company; Who are culpable either of the act, or of the force; and who were present, either men or women, and of what age soever they be, if they can speak, or have any discretion; Form of the charge where a person is slain. 4 E. 1. st. 2. Where a person slain is found in the fields or woods. Wounds. Persons drown dead. And how many soever be found culpable; they shall be taken and delivered to the sheriff, and shall be committed to the gaol; And such as be found and be not culpable, shall be attached until the coming of the judges of assize. And, by the same statute, if it fortune any such man be slain, which is found in the fields, or in the woods, first it is to be inquired whether he were slain in the same place or not; And if he were brought and laid there, they should do so much as they can to follow their steps that brought the body thither, whether he were brought upon a horse or in a cart. It shall also be inquired if the dead person were known, or else a stranger, and where he lay the night before. Also by the same statute, all wounds ought to be viewed, the length, breadth, and deepness; and with what weapons; and in what part of the body the wound or hurt is; and how many be culpable; and how many wounds there be; and who gave the wound. In like manner, by the said statute, it is to be inquired of them ed or suddenly that be drowned, or suddenly dead, whether they were so drowned or slain, or strangled by the sign of a cord tied strait about their necks, or about any of their members, or upon any other hurt found upon their bodies. And if they were not slain, then ought the coroner to attach the finders, and all other in the company. Persons dying in prison. 7 G. 4. c. 64. as to depositions. Binding over witnesses. He ought also to inquire of the death of all persons who die in prison, that it may be known whether they died by violence, or any unreasonable hardships; for if a prisoner, by the duress of the gaoler, come to an untimely death, it is murder in the gaoler, and the law implies malice in respect of the cruelty. 3 Inst. 52.91. And this inquest upon prisoners ought to consist of a party jury, that is, six of the prisoners (if so many there be), and six of the next vill or parish, not prisoners. Umfreville's Coron. 212. By stat. 7 G. 4. c. 64. §4. (repealing the stat. 1 & 2 Ph. & M. c. 13. Coroner's duty 5.), it is enacted, "That every coroner, upon any inquisition before him taken, whereby any person shall be indicted for manslaughter or murder, or as an accessary to murder before the fact, shall put in writing the evidence given to the jury before him, or as much thereof as shall be material; and shall have authority to bind by recognizance all such persons as know or declare any thing material touching the said manslaughter or murder, or the said offence of being accessary to murder, to appear at the next court of oyer and terminer, or gaol delivery, or superior criminal court of a county palatine, or great sessions, at which the trial is to be, then and there to prosecute or give evidence against the party charged, and every such coroner shall certify and subscribe the same evidence, and all such recognizances, and also the inquisition before him taken, and shall deliver the same to the proper officer of the court in which the trial is to be, before or at the opening of the court." Penalty for neglect of these provisions. §5. "If any justice or coroner shall offend in any thing contrary to the true intent and meaning of these provisions, the court to whose officer any such examination, information, evidence, bailment, recognizance, or inquisition ought to have been delivered, shall, 7 G. 4. c. 61. upon examination and proof of the offence in a summary manner, set such fine upon every such justice or coroner as the court shall think meet." §6. "All these provisions, relating to justices and coroners, shall They apply to apply to the justices and coroners, not only of counties at large, all coroners. but also of all other jurisdictions." The principal alterations from the provisions of the repealed act introduced by the above statute are, that the coroner is to put in writing the evidence itself, instead of the effect of the evidence, as required by the stat. of Ph. & M., and that he is required to subscribe the evidence when taken. evidence. The jury must hear evidence on all hands, if it be offered to Defendant's them, and that upon oath, because it is not so much an accusation or an indictment, as an inquisition or inquest of office. 2 Hale, 157. (a) In R. v. Scorey, 1 Leach, 43., the court of K. B. granted a rule against the coroner, to shew cause why a criminal information should not be filed against him for refusing, on taking an inquisition super visum corporis, to receive evidence on the part of the person accused. Whether the coroners' court Garnett v. Ferrand, 6 B. & C. 611. In this case the court of K.B. held, that an action of trespass could not be maintained against is a coroner for turning a person out of a room where he was about to lic court. take an inquisition, on the ground that no action will lie against the judge of a court of record, for any act done by him in his judicial capacity. And, in the course of giving the judgment of the court, Lord Tenterden made the following observations on the ques tion, whether the court of the coroner is an open one? "It is argued, on the part of the plaintiff, that the court of the coroner is a public court; that it is, and ought to be, open to the entrance of all H.M.'s subjects, or, at least, of so many as the place will contain; and it is averred, and not denied on the record, that, on the occasion in question, there was room for the presence of the plaintiff. The court was assembled for an inquest on the view of the body of a person then lying dead. Now it is obvious that such an inquiry ought, for the purposes of justice, in some cases, to be conducted in secrecy; it is a preliminary inquiry, which may or may not end in the accusation of a particular individual; it may be requisite that a suspected person should not, in so early a stage, be informed of the suspicion that may be entertained against him, and of the evidence on which it is founded, lest he should elude justice by flight, tampering with witnesses, or otherwise. Another matter, as that of deodand, may be consequential to the inquiry; but nothing that is done will be conclusive upon the person to be affected by it. All is traversable. It was admitted in the argument, that secrecy and exclusion may be proper and necessary when charge and accusation begin. It is obvious, that this may begin as soon as the evidence begins. Cases also may occur, in which privacy may be requisite for the sake of decency; others, in which it may be due to the family of the deceased. Many things (a) He ought, it should seem, to examine a surgeon as to the cause of death. R. v. Quench, 4 C. & P. 571. 4 E 1. st 2. Inquiry as to the murderer's lands and goods. Flight. Township amerced for an escape. Deodands. Coroner's rolls. Sheriff's rolls. Burial. Form of inquisition. must be disclosed to those who are to decide, the publication whereof to the world at large may be productive of mischief, without any possibility of good. Who, then, is to decide, whether privacy be necessary or proper? We answer, the coroner, and the coroner alone, and that the propriety of his decision cannot be questioned in an action." And by the aforesaid statute (4 E. 1. st. 2.), if any be found culpable of the murder, the coroner shall immediately go to his house, and shall inquire what goods he hath, and how much land he hath, and what it is worth. And when they have thus inquired upon every thing, they shall cause all the land, corn, and goods to be valued, in like manner as if they should be sold immediately; and thereupon they shall be delivered to the whole township, which shall be answerable before the judges for all. He shall also inquire, whether the persons found guilty fled; for which flight they forfeit goods and chattels. 2 Haw. c. 9. § 27. 51. And if any person be slain or murdered in the day-time, and the murderer escape untaken, the township shall be amerced. 3 H. 7. c. 1. Concerning horses, boats, carts, and the like, whereby any are slain, which properly are called deodands, they also shall be valued and delivered unto the towns as before. 4 E. 1. st. 2. By stat. 3 & 4 W. 4. c. 99. § 29. (see tit. Fines, and Forfeited Recognizances), an account in writing of all deodands, found or forfeited to or for the use of H. M., shall, within fourteen days after such deodands shall accrue, be made out by the coroners, with the names and residences of the parties liable, and transmitted to the treasury and to the commissioners of audit, and also certified and estreated into the court of exchequer. All which things must be enrolled in the rolls of the coroner. 4 Ed. 1. st. 2. And the sheriff shall have counter-rolls with the coroner, of things belonging to their office. 3 Ed. 1. c. 10. Immediately upon these things being inquired, the bodies of such persons being dead or slain shall be buried. 4 Ed. 1. st. 2. [As to the burial of persons guilty of suicide, see Vol. III. (Criminal Law,) p. 353.] A coroner's inquisition ought to shew, on the face of it, of what place the party who took it was coroner, and that it was taken by the oath of "honest and lawful men." 2 Ld. Raym. 1305. R. v. Evett, 6 B. & C. 247. A coroner's inquest omitted to state the place where the death happened, or where the body was found; the names of the jurors were not inserted in the body of the inquisition, and it was subscribed by them with the initials only of their Christian names: it was held, that these were defects in substance, and could not be amended, and the inquisition was quashed. The inquisition found that the death was occasioned by a coach and horses, the property of A. and B. and Co.: and it was held, that this finding could not be altered upon affidavits, that the property was in A. and B. alone. Ibid. |