JUSTICE AND HER SCALES.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume II, Issue 54, 13 January 1868, Page 3

JUSTICE AND HER SCALES.

i (From'the London ■“ Tomahawk.”) It'appears -tbatthree-and-forty tradesmen of Newington have been fined £67 10s. (about £1: 12$ each) for an offence which the law smilingly regardsas a commercial indiscretion. At a Special Sessions held the other day they were convicted of “ making use of false weights and measures,” that is to say, of robbing their customers systematically. “Larceny,” or “ theft " is defined to be “ the taking or the carrying away of the personal goods of another, with intent to deprive the owner of them,” and it must be obvious that to .plunder a man across a counter is nothing of the kind. •If this does not strike the law student at once, possibly the following brief table will help him to elucidate the matter, as it evolves that recognised principle of English law, that justice ought always tp be blindfold when she has hold of the scales. CeIMES . INDISCRETIONS. To be followed by im- To result in a slight prisonment, hard la- fine, and as fiourishbour and utter social, -ing abusiness asever. ruin. (1.) . (I-) Taking away from Robbing anyone or any one a square yard same by selling him of linen, in the shape of fourteen yards for fifa .-pocket handkerchief, teen. (2.) (2.) Taking one half-pen- Defrauding one of nyworth of milk. 12 half-pennyworths in succession, and supplying its place with pump water, horses’ brains mnd chalk. ‘(3.) (3.) Stealing a penny-loaf Stealing bread sufficient to make a dozen quartern loaves, by a series -of .periodical thefts. (40 a) , Passing bad money. Disposing of bad. adulterated and poisoned food or'drink. (».) (">.) All open thefts easily All secret thefts to to be detected, and be detected with the likely to be-committed greatest difficulty, and on the rich or those in committed almost endeceut circumstances, tifely on the poor and those who can least afford to be rubbed.