JUDGE RICHMOND'S CHARGE

West Coast Times, Issue 630, 1 October 1867, Page 3

JUDGE RICHMOND'S CHARGE

INVEST COAST TIMES, SEPT. 18.)

In charging the Grand Jury at the opening of the present Criminal Sessions of the Supreme Court, Mr Justice Richmond had a comparatively easy duty to perform. The calendar is happily much lighter than usual, and the most serious case — that of manslaughter by Griffith Jones — was, as was ovideut from the depositions, attended by circumstances of an extenuating character, that reduced it far below the standard of offences usually classed under that designation. His Honor made a. passing allusion to this case, but did not deem it of sufficient importance to dwell upon it at any length, reserving his ,commeuts ujjon the law as affecting homicide until his summing up on the trial. The only subject to which MiRichmond pointedly called the attention of the Grand Jury was the present objectionable mode of preparing Crown prosecutions. The brevity of this charge and the paucity of the topics referred to in it, we accept as evidence not only of the gratifying lightness of the criminal calendar, but as proof of the cessation of many of the causes of complaint as to the mode of administering justice in this district, I which have hitherto formed necessary topics for the Judge of Assize to refer to . Many of the complaints which filled the past presentments of Grand Juries have ceased to have any foundation. Great improvements have taken place in our prison arraugements and discipline. But a few months back our columns were filled with appeals from the '• log-huts" which constituted Her Majesty's Gaol in Hokitika, aud in which debtors and felons, convicts and persons prcsuniabtylinnocent, were huddled together without regard either to health or decency, and uuder conditions almost rivalling those of the Black Hole of Calcutta. To so great a height had this abomination reached, that at one time serious intentions were entertained of pulling down these miserable structures and setting their jjjmates free, as a measure of humanity Mr Justice Gresspn, on

the occasion of one of his judicial visits, spoke in terms of indignation and horror of the conditions under which prisoners were confined, and read a medical report on the subject, which he had deemed it necessary to obtain. We are happy to say that all this is passed; and that fiokitikahasnow agaol tolerably well adapted for its uses, in the internal arrangements of which many important improvements have been made since it was first opened for the reception of prisoners. One of the gravest complaints which the Grand Jury has hitherto had occasion, to make to the Judge, has had reference to the insufficiency of the judicial arrangements. Without a District Court, and with only half-yearly sittings I of the Supreme Court, abuses in the administration of criminal law were inevitable. Long terms of imprisonment before trial — in many instances when the accused person was ultimately acS quitted of the offence charged against hini — made so-called justice a mockery. We have now both a District Court established, with a Resident Judge, and sittings of the Supreme Court three times a year. All the demands of the district in connection with these matters, have thus been complied with ; and the Judge has no longer occasion to refer to them. Unless, therefore, something of a very special character arises out of the Calendar itself, the Judge has much fewer topics than formerly upon which to descant in his Charge to the Grand Jury. In the present instance, His Honor has confined himself to some comments on the mode in which Crown prosecutions are conducted. Disclaiming any intention to make personal charges, he condemned the S3'stem •as radically wrong and defective, and as calculated to cause justice to miscarry. No doubt it is a serious defect in the whole system, that the responsibility of preparing a case for the Court, is divided in unascertained proportionsamongst the police, the committing magistrates, and the crown prosecutor. We hardly understand, however, the exact nature of the remedy which His Honor would' propose. The action of the police 'in gathering the data upon which every accusation must rest, is necessary in the first instance. The intervention of the committing magistrate is necessary before any case can be sent for trial. And it is upjn the depositions taken before the magistrate that the Crown Prosecutor frames his indictment. Except as having witnesses in charge, to be produced in Court when required, we apprehend the police have no connection with the prosecution after the enquiry before the Magistrate is concluded. Nor has, or ought the Magistrate to have, any thing to ,do with the case after his warrant of committal has been signed. His Honor said " Often the Crown Prosecutor came into Court, apparently knowing very little more about it than the Judge himself may know from a persual of the depositions." And in another place his Honor says, '* it is to be lamented that the conduct of public prosecutions is not from first to last placed in professional hands, so that a thorough sifting of the evidence might take place before the case came into Court." We can only understand his Honor to suggest either that the Crown Prosecutor should habitually attend in every Resident Magistrate's Court to conduct preliminary charges, and that having secured a committal he should work the case up against the prisoner during the intervalbetween the committal and the trial; or that he should assume the functions of a private Judge. As it is, the Crown Prosecutor is supposed to have all the depositions before him and upon 'them to frame his indictment. The committing Magistrate it is presumed is to take the evidence on the preliminary examination, and to cause the depositions to be recorded in due form. If the Magistrate cannot do that he is unfit for his position ; If the Crown Prosecutor cannot in the face of these depositions frame a proper indictment he is unfit for his.

His Honor, however, predicts that under the present system the time will come when the public will be startled by some great failure of justice ; and speaks pointedly of several cases included in the present calendar,, " requiring considerable address on the part of the prosecution on account of the difficulties of proof." It is evident that His Honor has not delivered his mind fully. He is apprehensive of grave consequences, the probability of which is not patent to the public. He sees defects in the system which his words do not sufficiently indicate. We hope that in making their presentment the Grand Jury will refer to this important topic in terms which will elicit from his Honor a fuller explanation of his views on a subject of very . great importance.