SIMPLIFYING CRIMINAL TRIALS

Nelson Evening Mail, 26 May 1916, Page 3

SIMPLIFYING CRIMINAL TRIALS

A NOTABLE CHANGE IN ENGLAND.

It should remain for ever a -wonderful testimony to the English character, writes a, legal correspondent of The Times, that in the middle of a European war the Legislature has made a revolution in criminal procedure. There are critics who deprecated such action when the minds of men were dominated by other and vital business : and, no doufot, the provisions of the Indictments Act, 1915, which will come into force on April 1, may yet prove to be ill-digested in some parts. Nevertheless, the measure will relieve our' Criminal Courts of a long-standing popular reproach. Henceforth a man. who is .proved by evidence to be guilty cannot hope to escape the penalty of his offence by a mere legal quibble. A glance at the past will show the drastic nature of the innovation made by the new statute.

No chapters in our legal Tecords piovide more startling reading than those which tell how hundreds of undoubted felons have been set at large merely because ingenious counsel had found some slight error or .some word omitted in the drawing of the indictment. Indeed, the pufolic could not he blamed if they thought at times that legalism had run mad. Miscarriages of justice were frequent, because of a pedantic demotion to technicalities'.

The acquittal of the Earl of Cardigan in the House of Lords in 1841 is a notable example. He "was indicted fo:- feloniously shooting at Captain Harvev Garnett Phipps Tnckett with intent" to murder "him. The charge .arose out of a duel iii which Captain Tnckett was wounded. It was submitted for the prisoner that the case failed ■because Captain Tnckett's name in full as given in the indictment had not been proved by the prosecution. The name proved was Harvey.Tuckett only; the other names were not proved. Lord Donman, who presided, and. all the other lords—among them. Lords "Lyndhiir'st. Brougham, and Abiriger—:tobk the view that the indictment' had hot been and the prisoner was therefore discharged. It was on. that occasion that,. the Diike of Cleveland qualified the customary formula, and said, "Not guilty legally, •upon my honour." Manv similar cases which, brought discredit on the administration of justice in our Criminal Ooxirts are on record. But such things can never happen again after April 1. There is a businesslike airafbout the new act. Its phrasing is simple and direct and, it is to . be hoped, suffificiently comprehensive. A schoolboy could read and understand any section of it. It is Tight that it should be so. because section 6 is designed- to-impose penalties in costs "where it appears to the Court that an indictment contains, unnecessary matter, or is of unnecessary length, or. is materially, defective in any respect." The need of such a. provision will he obvious to anyoue who has ever listened to the medie''.al rigmarole in some indictments about the accused" not having the fear of God before his eyes, lout being mo7ed and seduced by the devil," etc. Sir Harry Poland, in an introduction to an admirable little' book, on the. tct written by Mr Herman Cohen, , recalls' a. remarkable indictment which was once drawn by Lord Justice Bowen id a. Government prosecution.' That indictment when engrossed on parchment and presented at the Old Bailey-was 90 yards in length and contained 145 counts. Sir Harry Poland comments upon the cumbrous and sometimes amusing language to be found' in indictments, and he points out that even as recehtlv as December, 1914, in the case of R«x. v. Ahlers (31 The Times Law Reports, 141) it was alleged that the prisoner had been '.'seduced by the devil.;"' The old-fashioned: lawyer who reveres snch archaisms will be. shocked to find that according to the rules made under the act "figures and ab l bi-eviations may be used- in an indictment for expressing anything which is commonly expressed thereby." He will be equally shocked to !be told that:—-. "The. statement of offence shall de scribe ihe offence shortly in ordinary language, avoiding as far as possible the use of technical terms, and' without necessarily stating all the essential elements of the offence." •Nothing could he simpler than the new form"of indictment "for murder:— "Statement of Offence. "MurdeT. "Particular of Offence. "A.8., on the day of —> in the County of —, murdered J.S. " • This is the chief but not the only innovation in the act. Mr Cohen rightly questions the wisdom of omitting the word 'feloniously," or the phrase "of his malice aforethough." It might have been. to retain words which drew distinctions between degrees of gravity in crimes. "I'll give yon a sovereign for that dog of, yours, old man." "A sovereign ! Why that dog's got a pedigree as long as your arm. Cost me 50 sovereigns." "That's all right. You can keep the pedigree. I only want the dog."