16. Duncan
17 172 Certified. That we have perused the annexed petition of Cheong Cheen, alias Cheong Asco. That we formed the jury before whom the said Cheang Cheen, alias Cheong Asco was tried on the said twenty-fourth day of January last. That the circumstances set forth in the said annexed petition, we believe to be true, and we humbly submit to Your Excellency: that from the notoriously bad character of the said Too Apo, as has been shown from the fact of his having been convicted and sentenced on a charge of feloniously extorting money by threats, and upon whose testimony alone the said Cheang Cheen, alias Cheang Asot was convicted, and which fact was unknown to us at the time of giving our verdict against him (or assuredly we should have acquitted him, there being no other evidence beyond that of the said Too Apo against him), that Your Excellency will be pleased to take his case into your merciful consideration, reverse his sentence, and release the said Cheang Cheen, alias Cheang Asco from further imprisonment. Dated at Victoria, this eighth day of June in the year of Our Lord one thousand eight hundred and forty-eight.
Jurymen } (Signed) W. Emany
J. Meredith
R. B. Sherard
Robt Duncan
Henry Hart
G. Duddell
Moses
W. M. Mr. Iver
B. Ellis
The following appears to be the state of the case:- The Prisoners (before named) were all convicted at the foregoing Sessions of the Vice Admiralty Court:- the two first of piracy, and the latter of being an accessory to the said piracy before the fact, upon the evidence, principally, if