"JURY-SQUARING"

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 93, 20 April 1920, Page 8

"JURY-SQUARING"

PUBLIC SCANDAL IN VICTORIA,

, ' (7BOM OUR OWN COItRESPONDEST.) SYDNEY, 15th April Tlie system of "jury-squaring" has become so prevalent, in Victoria that an agitation is afoot in that State to abolish the jury system of trying persons charged with crimes, and establishing instead a method of trial by three judges. It is not making much headway, however; the old British trial-by-jury dies hard, even when it is used to defeat the ends of justice.

According to the Age, which has published several sensational articles on this subject, there exists in Victoria a complete organisation for the corruption of juries. The organisation is controlled by a man—the master mind—who is equally well known to the polioe, the members of the underworld, and, in a, lesser degree, to the outside public. Publication of his name would cause a sensation. . Behind him there stretches a highly efficient network, the primary object of which is to secure a perversion of justice—when a sufficiently. large sum is paid. The head of the gang has under his direct control a number of agents operating in various suburbs, and through one or other the accused person is approached and asked how much he will pay to have the jury "rigged." The police know positively that these things are done—but everything is carried out so carefully and cunningly that it is almost impossible to secure direct evidence. When the arrangement is made with the criminal, the members of the jury are deftly approached. There is generally at least one man among twelve who is susceptible to the touoh of gold. Presumably aware of their practical immunity from'arrest, the efforts of the gang have recently been advanced with brazen effrontery. A reputedly wealth y man was arrested on a criminal charge. He was approached by a member of the gang with the suggestion that he could secure freedom at the cost of several hundred pounds. There was another case in which the detectives are convinced that two jurymen were "squared." Two men, despite a strongly adverse summing-up by the judge, were acquitted, and there is ground for believing that the price of the acquittal was £5000. ' The police, who are positive of the guilt of the two men, say that the bribe actually passed in cash.