whatever to do with this case. If you believe the evidence of Chan Ayut you have a right to call upon the prisoners for their defence, but you have no right to adjourn this case from week to week till the other case is finished. These defendants have nothing to do with that case. These three men before your Worship are on trial for their lives, and their case ought to be conducted in a legal, formal, and proper manner; and I submit, with all respect to your Worship, that the case is not being conducted in such a manner when it is being adjourned from week to week. If your Worship believes the evidence of Chun Ayut, if your Worship believes that Dr. Hartigan, Mr. Chun Kai Ming and Ho Ki have all gone into the box and told deliberate falsehoods, the prisoners will make their defence, but if not I submit there is no case against them. Your Worship has been a long time in this colony, and you know how difficult it is for a man to defend himself against officials who are in pay of the Chinese Government, because it is almost impossible to get witnesses to come forward and give evidence when they know that their relations are in the power of the Chinese Government, and the witnesses themselves may be spirited away before they can go down to the Supreme Court. I can assure your Worship that numbers of people have spoken to me in the street, knowing that this was a trumped-up charge, but who are unwilling to come into this court and give evidence, because they know that their relatives would pay the penalty with their lives. If you believe the evidence of Chun Ayat then the case ought to be proceeded with at once and the prisoners allowed to make their defence. The defence which I intend to make will be the proving of an alibi, and if this case is again adjourned fresh charges may be brought by the Chinese Government which it will be impossible for me to disprove, when the Government know exactly where the defendants were at such and such a date.
His Worship—I cannot agree in any way, with the statement made by Mr. Dennys with regard to the promises I have made during the hearing of the case. The action I have taken throughout these proceedings I have made public, and if I pass over what Mr. Dennys has said with regard to the promises I have made, it is not that I agree with him, but because I do not consider them worthy of further notice. I have here before me in writing the course that was pursued:—“Mr. Dennys applied to have Li Loi arrested on charge of subornation of perjury and Leung Ayow for perjury. Mr. Caldwell applied for time to bring rebutting evidence. The Magistrate declined to take any action in the matter but granted time to allow the solicitors for the defence to take what action they thought fit. The case to be remanded till the following day. In the interval action taken by a private individual, and Li Loi and Leung Ayow charged with subornation of perjury and perjury. Mr. Dennys asks for release of defendants. The Magistrate declines to take any action until the case against Leung Ayow is concluded and proposes to adjourn the case from week to week. Case came on again. Mr. Quincey states that perjury case is still proceeding. The case again remanded. Mr. Dennys on behalf of second and third defendants, and Mr. Holmes, on behalf of first, ask for their discharge. The application refused. Mr. Dennys, and Mr. Holmes ask for bail. Caldwell objects. Bail refused. The Magistrate, in reference to the application of Mr. Francis to be allowed to bring further evidence, in the event of Leung Ayow being convicted of perjury, gives formal notice that should such event occur, he will consider that a prima facie case has been made out.” I am now informed that the €430 is no prima facie case. I am now committed for trial. I cannot believe that the solicitors for the defence think that the other case is yet concluded.
A criminal case is not concluded until the prisoner is either found guilty or acquitted. I shall therefore wait until the case is concluded and remand this one until Monday, April 4th, at 10 o'clock.
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The Daily Press.
29th April.
THE RENDITION CASE.
Ching Sam and Tsang Chun, whose rendition is asked for by the Chinese Government on a charge of burglary and murder, were brought up on remand.
Mr. Caldwell appeared for the prosecution. Mr. Dennys for the second prisoner, and Mr. Holmes for the first.
Mr. Caldwell stated that Mr. Francis, Q.C., who had appeared for the prosecution on the last occasion, had been called away to Shanghai.
It was decided to proceed in Mr. Francis's absence.
Inspector Quincey gave evidence as to the death of Shap, a prisoner in the same case, who committed suicide in the gaol on Wednesday night.
Mr. Dennys then addressed the court on the points of law raised by Mr. Francis on the last occasion and afterwards proceeded to analyse the evidence for the prosecution, his address occupying two hours and a half. With reference to the contention of the prosecution that the court had merely to satisfy itself that a prima facie case was made out and could not enter into evidence for the defence he argued that the Magistrate was bound to satisfy himself absolutely that the prisoners were guilty before committing them to gaol pending the Governor's orders, the Governor being in this matter merely an executive officer and bound to deliver the prisoners up if the Magistrate found them guilty; that the Magistrate was bound to hear and take into consideration the defence if there was any case to answer; but that in the present case the prosecution had utterly broken down and that the prisoners were therefore entitled to their discharge. With regard to the first point he said he thought it was utterly impossible to find any precedent outside Hongkong that would exactly guide his Worship, but several cases were heard here last year in which a man named Chung Chee was claimed by the Chinese authorities for various offences. The prosecution in the first case was conducted by Mr. Ewens, and the prisoner was defended by Mr. Wotton. Evidence was there gone into on behalf of the prisoner in the case in which Mr. Ewens prosecuted, and the prisoner was discharged, or at any rate he was not given up on the charge investigated by the Magistrate. Mr. Caldwell appeared for the prosecution in the other cases brought against the same prisoner, and those cases he believed were proved to the satisfaction of the Magistrate. In those cases the Magistrate allowed the witnesses for the prosecution to be cross-examined, and witnesses to be called on behalf of the prisoner. In this case it had been contended that the Magistrate could not accept on behalf of the prisoner any evidence whatever, and a very eminent authority on extradition, Clark, was quoted. Nothing could be stronger than the law as laid down by Mr. Clark, and he (Mr. Dennys) would quite agree with all that had been said by the learned counsel (Mr. Francis) with regard to that if this case came under the extradition law as applied in England under the act of 1870 and the extension of that Act in 1873. But section 17 of the Act said the Act might be applied with certain modifications by Order in Council to any British possession. That had not been done with regard to Hongkong, and the law by which the court was governed was contained in Ordinance 2 of 1850 and the explanatory Ordinance 2 of 1871. Before going into those Ordinances he would ask his Worship's attention to the Treaty referred to in the second Ordinance. By the Treaty of Tientsin, section 21, two different things were provided for, one referring to criminal subjects of China who take refuge in Hongkong, and the other to Chinese offenders who take refuge on board British ships at the open ports of China.
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