CONCERNING JUSTICE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26624, 21 November 1947, Page 9

CONCERNING JUSTICE

Sir, —I notice in this morning’s Daily Times in reference to a night prowler at Waimate. that “it is understood that a group of young men has undertaken to deal out summary justice to the prowler.” With-the desire of the young men to stop the annoyance X have every sympathy The suggestion of summary justice Is so disturbing that some attention needs to be drawn to it.

If these young men wish to help the police to catch the offender, they can be congratulated on their good citizenship. But if the report that they Wish to take the law into their own hands is correct, and they intend to do more than to detain a suspept until he can be taken in charge by :,Ne police, they are very bad citizens If:'. ?ey were asked to comment on the lynchings which occur from time to time in the United States, they would' probably condemn them heartily They would agree that legal justice, with its much slower processes of arrest and trial, is the right of all. We should all realise that the desire of well-meaning men to take short cuts and to administer punishment informally as they think fit—the spirit, in fact, shown by the young men of Wairriate—is precisely the spirit which leads to lynchings and the break-down of law.— —T am. etc.. \ Two Wrongs.