JUSTICES' JUSTICE.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2237, 3 June 1881, Page 3

JUSTICES' JUSTICE.

Our remarks the other day upon the subjeot of Justices' justice have, it appears, attracted some attention, and in consequence of some communications to ourselves, we have been at some pains to ascertain what it was that was really done by the Bench on the occasion to which our remarks applied. We do not find that we were substantially in error in the statement we gave of tho case. The boy was accused of discharging firearms. A witness did give evidence that he heard a report, that a bullet whistled by him while he was walking in Lower High street, and that the boy admitted that he had discharged the shot. No malice prepense was imputed, but the Bench evidently considered the case proved, beoause otherwise they could have no jurisdiction to make the lad pay the costs. And this is substantially our case. If the lad was innoeont, he ought to have been let off altogether; if he was guilty, the Bench ought to have inflicted upon him a punishment proportionate to the recklessness with which he placed a fellow-creature within a few inches of probable death. The Benoh did neither the one nor the other. By imposing on him the penalty of costs they showed that they considered him guilty. By limiting the punishment to this ridiculous degree they showed that, in their opinion, the recklessness of which we havo spoken did not call for any severer punishment. We hove nothing, therefore, on the faots as they thus stand, to withdraw from the severe censure which we felt it our duty to pronounce upon tho judicial misconduct of tho Benoh. But, while the above are unquestionably the facts kb they must be taken to have been understood by the Bench, we are given to understand that they are not in reality the exact facts of the case. It is represented to us that while, upon the evidenco, the boy was guilty of an offence against the law, he was not guilty of the precise aot charged against him by the police. It appears that, whatever may be the case with the magistrates, the Legislature has had so much anxiety to put down offences of this sort that there are no less than three sets of enactments under which the police might have proceeded. There is the old police ordinanoe ; there is the City Council by-law ; and there is the Public Works Act, 1876. The police elected to proceed under the last of these. By section 99 it is provided that, if any person discharges any firearms within fifty feet from the side of a road, he shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding £5. Wo are told that it appeared upon tho evidence that the point at which the lad was standing when he discharged the shot wis probably more than fifty feet from the road. If this be so the Bench had nothing for it but to dismiss the information. They might very properly have given the lad a lecture, but how could they possibly order him to pay tho costs ? We cannot suppose tho Bench to havo deliberately made themselves liable to proceedings at law for enforcing a sentence in excess of their jurisdiction, and we must therefore take it that however the evidence was understood by others, they considered the offence proved, and gave sen-

tenoe accordingly. If they thought, as has been suggested to us, that the boy was guilty of an offence, although not preoiiely of the offence oharged, their proper oourse obviously was to advise the withdrawal of the information with a view to the commencement of proceedings do novo under tho proper enactment. And there would have been no difficulty in so doing. The sth seotion of the Canterbury Police Ordinance enacts that " every person who shall diccharge any firearms without lawful cause .... within the boundaries of any town within the province," shall forfeit any sum not exceeding £5. Here again we are told that this Ordinance does not apply, because tho discharge of firearms, in order to be within it, must be in a publio thoroughfare. It will be seen that the words which wo have extracted contain no such qualification. It is quite true that the same clause contains a provision against the discharge of firoworks, and that in order to be within the Ordinance the discbarge of a firework must be in a publio thoroughfare. But this qualification applies to fireworks only, and not to firearms. Tho clause runs as follows :—"Evory person who shall discharge any firearms without lawful cause, or discharge any firework in any publio thoroughfare, within the boundaries of any town within the province, shall" &c. The distinction is obvious. If there be a lawful cirase for it, firearms may bo discharged under cover of such lawful cause either in a public thoroughfare or anywhere else. With regard to fireworks the law takes no cognizance of these unless they are discharged in a public thoroughfare, and if they are so discharged, it recognises no lawful cause for the aot.

As we have already said, besides the Aot . and the Ordinance there is also the City Council by-law. The 19th section of by-law 12 provides that "no person shall without lawful cause or authority discharge or let off any firearms or fireworks of any kind whatever." As the Constitution Act provides that Provincial Ordinances are to be overridden by subsequent Aots of the General Assembly, and as the City By-laws are made under the powers of the Municipal Corporation Act, we suppose that within tho limits of the City the clause which we have just cited from the Police Ordinance would oease to operate if this by-law were valid. We are told, however, that the Besident Magistrate sometime since over-ruled tho whole of this bylaw on the ground that the penalty olause limited the discretion of the Benoh in imposing a fine to a minimum of ten shillings. We have yet to learn that the decision of any Besident Magistrate can be held conclusive as to the legality, or otherwise, of a by-law. On this particular point, it is well known that the minimum in question was inserted under advice, and was withdrawn from later bylaws, in deference to the wish of the then Besident Magistrate, who found that it sometimes hampered it inconveniently. Its presence was the ground of one of the numerous objections taken during the long wars of the cabs and the Council to the validity of the by-laws. It was never recognised, as we believe, either by the then Besident Magistrate or by the Supreme Court. But if the magistrates in the present shooting case thought fit to act as they might fairly enough do, upon the basis that the bylaw was invalid, the only result would be to send them back to the provincial Ordinance, the sufficiency of which, we imagine, we have made tolerably clear.