The Otago Witness.

Otago Witness, Volume 03, Issue 705, 3 June 1865, Page 11

The Otago Witness.

DUNEDIN, SATURDAY, JUNE 3.

The Criminal Sitting of the Supreme Court commenced on Thursday. The number of cases is not extraordinarily heavy ; in fact, there have frequently been more at previous sessions ; but on no former occasion has there been so many capital charges. Analysing the calendar, there are three charges of wilful murder, two of wounding with intent to kill or do grievous bodily harm, two of burglary, one of horse-stealing, five of stealing, one of embezzlement, two of obtaining money by false pretences, one of uttering a forged cheque, one of setting fire to premises, one of concealment of birth, and one of perjury. Of the capital charges, it will be remembered that one must be deducted from the number, as more properly belonging to a former session— Captain Jarvey — respecting whose case the jury could not agree to a verdict, being again to be put on his trial. Deducting this from the list, there remain two additional charges of wilful mnrder to come before the Court. It is generally assumed that the condition of the population of a country is indicated by a consideration of the criminal statistics ; that they form an index which, read read aright, tell of the prevalence of comfort or distress ; of wealth or poverty ; of education or ignorance.

There can he no question that where there is sufficient motive to the commission of a certain class of crimes, those will, as long as that inducement continues, form the prevailing cases brought before the courts of justice. Thus, under circumstances of general depression and distress among the inhahitantu of large commercial and manufacturing communities, there is invariably a great increase of larcenies and offences against property. The prospect of want, or the actual pressure of circumstances, leads numbers so situated to rush into crime rather than to endure privation ; and the offence will take form and shape accordingto the education, and associations, and status of the offender. Thus, it may be fairly anticipated, where the motive to crime is sufficiently powerful to induce a person moving in mercantile circles to attempt it, the effort will be to secure all the coveted advantages, and still to retain the same social position. Under such circumstances, most probably, there would be forgeries or attempts to obtain money by fraud in one form or other, generally ■with the delusive idea of successfal concealment. In such cases Mends or acquaintances are commonly the victims. It is an inroad upon the circle in which the offender moves. But it is not so where the mass of the population is in distress. When gaunt poverty visits the cottage of the artizan in over- populated communities, petty larcenies are the prevailing crimes. Humble in station, unknown excepting to their immediate neighbors suffering like themselves, their depredations are committed where they are not known. The rich and well to do are the sufferers, and the perpetrator of the misdeed hopes to escape by forming one of the mass of the poor and unsuspected. But there is no parallel in such cases between the colonies and older populations. Generally in recently settled lands, the motives to crime are of another character. Larcenies and burglaries and offences against property, are evidences of the existence in their midst of a criminal class — an exotic of noxious nature, not indigenous but imported — a something foreign to the circumstances of the country and the general character of its inhabitants. This class, like vultures scenting prey afar off follows in the wake of wealth. Its members are to be founi seeking the society of the dissipated and thoughtles?, tempting them to folly in order to filch them ; or when the prize is sufficiently glittering, contriving aud committing daring burglaries and robberies. It is not often that this class commits itself to assault or murder, but

{under certain circumstances such a consummation does sometimes occur, and the ! present session gives, at least, one instance. But more frequently the crime of homicide i in the colonies springs from a quarrel and a resulting affray. As a matter of course, comment upon the cases actually on the Calendar would he premature and unjust to the accused. The circumstances under which the offences have been perpetrated have been already published in recording the magisterial examinations prior to the committal of the prisoners, and nothing should be said that might directly or indirectly tend to induce a foregone conclusion in the minds of a jury. Of the whole number of cases, the large proportion of one fourth is for offences against the person, two indirectly affect society, but are more properly infractions of the moral law, and the remaining thirteen are offences against property.