The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY, AND Saturday Morning. Tuesday, December 20, 1887. COURT FINES AND FEES.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume I, Issue 82, 20 December 1887, Page 2

The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY, AND Saturday Morning.

Tuesday, December 20, 1887. COURT FINES AND FEES.

Be jmit and fear not; Let all the ends thou aim’et at be thy country's, Thy God’s, and truth's.

In the House the other day a member asked whether some alteration could not be made in the law to prevent the infliction of heavy costs on defendants who were fined a nominal sum for trivial ©fences, The Government have promised that during the recess they would give the question their consideration, and would see if it could not be provided that a mere letter acknowledging guilt would not suffice, thereby avoiding the costs payable under the existing regulations. The case in question was one of the ordinary quasi criminal cases. The defendant was fined five shillings and the costs amounted to between three and fourpouads, made up principally of mileage. There appears to be a good deal of reason in the suggestion of the Government, and there is little, as far as we can see, to urge against its adoption. The question appears of small importance on the face of it, but it opens up the more important subject of the existing charges* as regulated in carrying out the Court work. Not alone the criminal, but the civil proceedings might well be considered.

There can be no doubt that the penalty of having to pay such heavy costs as we have seen imposed in small cases, have, in some instances, become practically cases of hardship. Take, for instance, a man who is locked up at Ormond for a not very serious offence. He has to be brought down® and though he pleads guilty, he has to pay, not alone his fine, but a considerable sum for costs. Apart from this let us take a similar case to that which has been brought under the notice of the Minister of Justice. A man, some fifteen or twenty miles away, commits an offence of a trivial nature, an information is issued, and witnesses are brought before the Court. Though the offence is admitted a penalty must be inflicted, carrying with it costs. In such a case the costs must necessarily be considerable.

The pi oposal that defendants should be allowed to plead guilty by letter would do away with all witnesses’ expenses at least, and the fine could easily be enforced. Of course the

gravity of the offence would have to be considered for it would not do in a number of cases to allow a person to' plead guilty to a charge, the natnre of which was not known to the Magistrate. It is the evidence alone in some cases that drags to light the seriousness of an offence. But in cases where it must be apparent that the charge needs no full investigation and the infliction of a nominal penalty would meet the exigencies of the case, there is no need -to inflict upon a man a cha’ge which probably he cannot pay other than by wiping the debt oft by a few days in gaol. Dealing with the civil procedure of civil cases; there are many alterations that are most necessary to facilitate the proceedings. The fees are fixed at a high rate, it may be for the purpose of lessening the practice of turning the Courts into large collecting machines, Be this as it may every opportunity should be given to allow a plaintiff to recover what he is honestly entitled to. The imposition of a high fee prohibits many persons from prosecuting a claim, the want of funds standing in the way. To issue three summonses on people at Ormond for, say one pound each, it costs no less than thirty-nine shillings, thirty of which go to the GovernmentA plaintiff is not allowed to serve his own claims, otherwise he would be able to save the mileage. Naturally people think twice before they risk good money after, probably, bad. This is one of many alterations tha might be suggested.