DEATH PENALTY TO STAY

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4804, 30 June 1939, Page 2

DEATH PENALTY TO STAY

ABOLITION TEST REJECTED. M.P. ADVOCATES GUILLOTINE. Sir Samuel Hoare, the Home Secretary, opposed a new clause to suspend the death penalty for five years when a standing committee renewed consideration of the Criminal Justice Bill in the House of Commons recently. The clause was rejected by 16 votes to 7. Mr. Benson (Soc., Chesterfield), who had moved the clause, said that le was convinced that if the death penalty went for five years it would never be reintroduced. Mr. Turton (Cons, Thirsk and Malton): When I began practising at the Bar I started with a point of view rather similar to Mr. Benson’s. But after I had been in a number of murder trials I came to a different point of view. “When you witness the trial of a prisoner,” he added, “or, as I have, prosecuted in the case of a man who disposed of an unwanted step-child by taking her by the feet and continuing to batter her against the wall until she was brained, and then burying her, and himself very nearly escaped detection, I think you must come to the conclusion that in certain cases you must retain the death penalty.” He suggested that there might be two different convictions, one in the first degree, sentence of death, and the other in the second degree, imprisonment for life.

No Innocent Man Condemned. Sir William Wayland (Cons., Canterbury) suggested that they might adopt the French method of the guillotine. “The guillotine,” he said, “has a greater deterrent effect on the wouldbe murderer or murderess. It is not quite so clean as our method, but I think it is far better. Ido not think we should go as far as the German method of beheading." Sir Samuel Hoare, opposing the new clause, said: “The capital sentence is a terrible act. It ends the life of a human being. It abandons the hope of reforming a criminal on this side of the grave. “Supposing this new clause were carried, the Home Secretary would be freed from a very grave and very unpleasant and very difficult responsibility.” “I can tell members of the committee,” he added, “that there is no duty of the Home Secretary that gives him more anxiety or is carried out by successive Home Secretaries with greater care and sympathy. “The Home Secretary in almost every case sees the judge and the judge’s notes on the case. He has also, in cases in which there may be a question of insanity, the help of his medical experts. l I am justified in saying that, with these safeguards, I do not believe that, in the lifetimes of any member of this committee, any innocent man* or woman has been condemned to death.” Navy Flogging To Go. ‘lf capital punishment at any time is to be abolished or suspended, it ought to be done with full consideration in a Bill actually devoted to that very serious subject and to nothing else. “This Bill is not really intended to deal with questions of this kind at all. I am not prepared to advise an experiment of this kind. I draw a clear distinction between wilful murder and all other crimes.” With regard to Mr. Turton’s suggestion that the death sentence should be simplified, Sir Samuel Hoare added: “I will take an early opportunity of discussing this with the judges or whatever might be the appropriate form of discussion." A new clause to abolish flogging in the Navy and to apply the clause abolishing penal servitude,” hard labour, and prison divisions to Army, Navy and Air Force courts-martial was agreed to.