122
13
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Chief Justice addresses himself to technical rather than connected with the actual merits of the question. He conceives that Mr Pollard had no other course than to proceed regularly by Appeal, although the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council Rainy & Justices of Sierra Leone had emphatically repudiated all right to hear appeals from judgments inflicting fines for contempt of court.
15. The Chief Justice also contends that as a petition to the Queen cannot be regarded as a judicial proceeding, all affidavits sworn in connection with such petition are not merely extra-judicial, but actually criminal and illegal.
19. In Rainy v. The Justices of Sierra Leone, the report states that when abandoning his appeal, William Rainy presented a petition to the Queen, which was referred by the Colonial Office to the Judicial Committee, and that a copy of the petition of Rainy was served on the Justices of Sierra Leone, and the answer as well as the petition of Rainy were supported by Affidavits filed on both sides. It was therefore natural that I should have undertaken to forward any petition received from Mr Pollard supported by Affidavits or other evidence.
Page 3.
I am therefore glad that the Chief Justice, as stated in his reply, mentioned to Mr Whyte his opinion as to the illegality of the Affidavits - for the latter has since
Enclosure 1.
Enclosure 4.
Pura- 160.
MTM