JURIES AMENDMENT BILL.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIV, Issue 1077, 25 July 1924, Page 6

JURIES AMENDMENT BILL.

PROVISION FOR MAJORITY VERDICT. The Juries Amendment Bill to provide for a five-sixths verdict of a jury in criminal, except capital, cases, passed through committee in the Legislative Council yesterday without amendment.

In moving the third reading, tho lion. J. MacGregor quoted instances of a majority verdict being taken under the German law.

Tho Hon. O. Samuel was still unconvinced (hat he should alter the opinion he had always held on the principle of the Bill. The mover had quoted from an old diary written some hundreds of years age the position of jury verdicts in Germany, but that nation had always been noted for its tyranny and its enmity to true liberty.

’Hie lion. T. W. Hislop said tho mover had invited him to alter }iin opinion because of a practice or doctrine of the German, nation, but he declined to accept the invitation. Scottish law was also quoted in support of the bill, but tho injustice of jury verdicts in Scotland had transported some of the host of ( its' citizens unjustly. Tho Hon. W. Earnshaw supported the third reading, and quoted a number of sexual eases where criminals had escaped through tho requirement of a unanimous verdict.

On a division, tho bill was read a third time, and passed by 18 votes to 5.