The Globe. THURSDAY, APRIL 24, 1879.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1615, 24 April 1879, Page 2

The Globe. THURSDAY, APRIL 24, 1879.

The public mind has boon much exercised during the last few days in reference to the case of Regina v Schwartz, and its sudden and unexpected termination. Previous to the proceedings being carried to the Supremo Court, a good deal of interost had boon manifested in them, and the Insurance Companies had thought proper to retain counsel to assist the examination in the Resident Magistrate’s Court, But it is what caused the prosecution to break down in so signal a manner in the Supreme Court which appears to have set the public mind upon an unusually sharp edge. Never, perhaps, in the records of our Law Courts did a Judge express himself in so pungent and forcible a manner as did Mr, Justice Johnston on this occasion when directing the jury to acquit the prisoner on more technical grounds. His Honor certainly did not mince his words, but on the contrary, while making them ns explicit as

possible, stated it as bis conviction that it was high time that some measures be taken to protect the public from so groat a scandal. Ho wished it to go forth that, owing to the grossest possible carelessness in the drafting of the indictment, the case would have to be withdrawn on a point of law, and ho wished to say, in open Court, most emphatically, that it was disgraceful that a most important prosecution had fallen to the ground through the misconduct—for it was no loss—of some one connected with the prosecution.” This is strong language. but not a whit stronger, we fancy, than the occasion warranted should lie used. Subsequently, we believe, a more than acrimonious difference of opinion sprung up between a well-known member of the Bar, Mr. Garrick, and the Crown Prosecutor, the issues of which misunderstanding—if wo bo permitted to use the term —could not bo settled by the Judge, nor evidence as to the facts brought before him, as Judges so situated have no locus standi in respect to matters which do not come within the four corners of their jurisdiction. As Mr. Justice Johnston ruled during the civil sittings last Monday, when the matter was once more moved before him, the Supremo Court is not the proper tribunal to decide upon differences of opinion as to the statements of facts arising between counsel. And hero we must remark that it is selfevident that the community at largo, to whom a groat wrong has certainly been done by this inconceivable miscarriage of justice in the Schwartz case, is situated precisely as the Judge was. What the public wants, and what it has a perfect and absolute right to demand, is that the administrative and executive machinery necessary to bring punishment home to those who outrage the laws, should bo provided for by those having the management of public affairs, and placed by them in the best and most effective order. With any controversies between officials, or those employed by them, arising from a negligent or inefficient mode of making this machinery perform its functions, the Government alone should deal. Results are what people require, and if these bo not obtained the minor question as to whether Jones, the clerk, or Brown, was specially retained to assist in this or that, is neither hero nor there in the eyes of the groat number. Judge Johnston thought it within his jurisdiction to toll the Court that after so great a scandal, it was high time that some measures bo taken “to protect the public.” So far as we can see, all the private debates in the world that might take place between contending members of the profession assembled either within the precincts of their own Law Society or elsewhere, would not satisfy public requirements if anything in the general manner of conducting prosecutions proved so faulty as to necessitate considerable alteration. We apprehend that the Judge, when making use of these somewhat ominious and suggestive words, felt that the time had arrived when the whole question of public prosecutions should bo maturely considered. We do not wish to cast any blame upon any especial person, at the present moment. Public interests do not demand that the result of sifting private differences on points of etiquette, veracity, or what not, which might exist between members of the bar, should bo dished up, let the pruriently curious feel over so eager to feast upon It. Who drew the indictment in Schwartz’s case, or failed to get up the necessary texts for successful argument, can scarcely bear upon the large view of the matter. It is with the dopai'tmental system which now obtains in regard to prosecutions that wo should turn in order to come within the meaning of the remark of the Judge which we last quoted. At the present moment it would seem that —officially speaking, at all events —no blame can attach anywhere for this lamentable fiasco. It much reminds one of the coroner’s traditional verdict “ Died by the visitation of God.” The present system of public prosecution is faulty in many parts, and no one more than Mr. Justice Johnston perhaps is aware of the fact. Lot us, for instance, examine into a few particulars of this Schwartz case, of those at least not open to bo questioned. First we have the preliminary proceedings in the Police Court, whore at times the prosecution assumes a variety of shapes without there being any rules to guide officials in the matter. Generally the police prosecute. At times—in largo towns only—counsel’s assistance is preferred them and accepted, or otherwise, as the police or the Bench may decide. In rare cases the Crown Prosecutor appears on the scene, but only when especially instructed by the Government. What this gentleman may do there, however, is totally disconnected with his work, which properly lies in preferring indictments in the Supremo Court, and supporting them by what depositions have been furnished him by the Registrar of the Supremo Court or by extraneous evidence more freshly obtained by the police. In Schwartz’s case, wo find that Superintendent Broham had requested Mr. Garrick, at the instance of the Insurance Companies, we presume, “ to assist” the Crown Prosector. Mr. Garrick had, a few days before, appeared in the Resident Magistrate’s Court to conduct the examination against Schwartz; this also had boon done at the request of the insurance people. Hr. Hart, on the other hand, states that Mr. Duncan did not consider himself bound to prosecute for the Crown. From this part of the story things are still more vague. Judge Johnson’s animadversions against the wretched and scandalous manner in which the indictment was framed alone fills the gap. No one seems to have seen or to have cared to overlook the the indictment until it was produced in Court. “ Too many cooks spoil the broth ” is a very threadbare old adage, and it is evident that it was not inapplicable here. Public rights and public interests fell between several stools and—officially speaking, again—it would seem to bo no one’s especial fault. The possibility of such a state of things obtaining ijS most unsatisfactory. It is high time that the Legislature slept in, and with a few clear cut enactments put a stop to all possible confusion.