17
7
In conclusion I must express a strong feeling "that the course taken would have been very dif- ferent if the outraged householder had been a European, and this case adds confirmation to the opinion which I had previously formed as to the unsatisfactory spirit which governs the relations "between the Police Force and the Chinese inha- bitants. If previous offences against Chinese on "the part of the Police, have been dealt with on
<.
*
the principle which has guided the Superinten- "dent's action in this case, the members of the "Force may well have come to believe that such acts are regarded, at least with complacency, by "their superiors, and the punishment of Sergeant SHEIK ALIM, it should be necessary for the "sake of example, will be awarded in respect of an offence for which he is only partially respon- sible."
66
K
FREDERICK STEWART,
Colonial Secretary.
Captain Superintendent of Police to Colonial Secretary.
No. 161.
SIR,
POLICE DEPARTMENT,
7th August, 1888.
I have the honour to report that after due con- sideration of His Excellency the Governor's Minute of the 4th August, 1888, in C.S.O. 1898, I adopted the alternative of sending Sergeant SHEIK ALIM for trial before a Stipendiary Magistrate. The case came on at the Magistracy, and was adjourned until the afternoon of the 8th instant.
2. I have further to inform His Excellency that no question whatever of class or race dis- tinction entered my mind with reference to the primary disposal of the case, and that the sole question that I considered was whether the case was one, which, having regard to the interests of both parties, could be the better dealt with by civil or criminal procedure, and that I gave my unbiassed preference to the former, as being more suitable. The question so far as affected Police Discipline appeared to me to be one that could well stand over for consideration, until the per- sonal and private portion of the affair had been judicially settled.
3. His Excellency has been pleased to remark that "The Captain Superintendent must well know the extreme reluctance of the Chinese to enter into legal conflict with the Government, especially with the Police, so that the redress to which the outraged person was confined, was practically none at all." With reference to this I have re- spectfully to state that I have no such knowledge as is presumed. So many Chinese have been brought up in English lawyers' offices, that I believe the knowledge of the impartiality of the British law is fully known to the Chinese Shop- keepers in this Colony, and that such reluctance has no longer any tangible existence. This belief is the more strengthened by the fact that I my-
र
self as Captain Superintendent of Police was within the last two years summoned by a Shop- keeper before the very Court in question to an- swer a demand for the recovery of some money which had been obtained by Government, and repayment of which was resisted by Government. I had therefore no reason to believe that I was naking the Petitioner a suggestion of a course other than one obvious and practicable.
4. With reference to the strong feeling ex- pressed by His Excellency in the concluding portion of His Excellency's Minute, I have re- spectfully to report that the entertainment of any such class or race feeling, as is therein referred to, is entirely opposed to my sentiments, and has no existence in fact; and that I possess letters from His Excellency's Predecessors, from former Attorneys General and other ligh Officials con- taining expressions of opinion wholly incompati- ble with the possible existence of any such feel- ing; and had I, or the Police Force under my command (one half of whom are Chinese) enter- tained and carried out any such class or race prejudices the evidence thereof may reasonably have been expected to have been prominently brought forward, and to have been the subject of official comment at some time during the twenty- one years that I have had the honour to com- mand the Police Force previous to His Excellen- ey's arrival in the Colony.
I have, &c.,
The Honourable
W. M. DEANE,
Captain Superintendent of Poliec.
THE COLONIAL SECRETARY.
PROCEEDINGS BEFORE THE POLICE
COURT,
(Extracted from the "Hongkong Daily Press"
9th August, 1888.)
Before MR. T. SE COMBE-SMITH.
of the
Charge against a Police Sergeant. SHEIK ALIM was charged, on the information of Lu FUNG TSE, with misconduct as a Police Constable, on the 24th July.
Mr. WOTTON appeared for the defence. LU FUNG TSE said-I am manager of a draper's shop, called the Yat Loong shop, No. 3, Jervois Street. At 12 noon on the 24th July last a foreign policeman, together with two Chinese policemen, came to the shop. One Chinese con- stable and the foreign coustable came inside. The other Chinese constable stopped outside. The defendant was the foreign constable. He went up to one of my fokis who was writing a letter in He the shop, and gave him a blow with his fist. did not hit my foki. The latter dodged the blow. Defendant then tried to strike him again, but be dodged that blow also. On seeing that the de- fendant was so furious, I called in the master of the shop. Defendant tried to hit my foki again, but he went upstairs. Defendant followed him upstairs. I told the other fokis to go up and see