REMOVAL OF CONVICTS FROM THE HORRIBLE GAOL AT NICOSIA, CYPRUS.

Samoa Times and South Sea Gazette, Volume 2, Issue 76, 15 March 1879, Page 3

REMOVAL OF CONVICTS FROM THE HORRIBLE GAOL AT NICOSIA, CYPRUS.

A curious scene has occurred at Nicosia, one that those who witnessed it are never likely to furget There have lately been tried a number of prisoners, accused of murder, of rape, and of murderous assaults. The Assistant Civil Commissioner of the district has been present at the trials, and the sentences hare received the approval of Sir Garnet Wolseley. It wcpld not have been possible, under the present Constitution of the island, for those sentences to have been altered by (lis Excellency, even bad there been good reasons for altering them, except by an axeieiso of arbitrary authority. For a measure of such energy •tkere was no need ; the sentences awarded were properly awarded, as far as it is easy to understand the law through interpretation, according to law ; but they were sentences, in some cases, of extreme leniency In one case, two brothers, Turks, broke into a house, ravished the occupant's wife, and stole his jewellery. The aggrieved man proceeded, as is the Turkish custom for the initiation of all proceedings, civil and criminal alike, hy petition against the offenders, addressing the Mudiriat, or local council, and praying for redress. Subsequently these two brothers went to his house and called him forth. One of them commenced an attack upon him with a small knife; the other then joined in the assault with, a large knife, and the unfortunate man \v;is ultimately stabbed to death No one can ■deny that this \v:is a brutal murder, Vu! the„murderers, placed upon their trial, received sentences only of 10 and 15 year's imprisonment The law, is far as ■■-•an be understood, under which tho sentence wits passed was an article of the Criminal Code, which lays down that a man who slays another without premeditation shall be condemned to imprisonment for a term not exceeding fifteen years. The horrors of the prison, its heavily-ironed occupants, its loathsome stench constituted an abomination that •could not be allowed to remain under .British rule. But the difficulty is to dispose of tho occupants. At, last tl.c High Commissioner succeeded in arranging that they should all be deported to tho Turkish mainland, except the prisoners under short sentences, and 200 of them were marched to Kyrenia for embarkation. The doors of the gaol were closed ; hut from a trap-door there were brought out the prisoners one hy one Their irons were removed; they were bound together by ropes, lightly but securely, in sections four abreast When 00 men bad thus been collected, they were marched off. The whole party was •divided into four companies. A detach inent of the Royal Engineers had been quartered in the Konak the previous .night, for it was au anxious moment.