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721
Supplemental Report of the Attorney General on
the case of Walter Jackson chargedwith mutiny on board
the "Satsuma".
The simple procedure suggested by Mr Seward is a matter which it is beyond the powers of this Government to introduce; or of the American Minister
at Pekin to approve.
So far as it affects American
criminals fugitive from Hong Kong, I cannot find any legal authority under which this Government could claim the surrender of an American (or any other foreigner) by his Consul at Shanghai, if he were found at that port after committing a crime in this Colony. It seems to me that if a foreigner committed murder or any other crime in Hong Kong, and then escaped to a treaty port, he would be beyond our reach and would be
safe; unless upon application to the Chinese authori- ties they allowed our officers to apprehend the offen-
der, or seized him and handed him over to our officers
I think on the other hand that the American
Consul at Shanghai would have a right under the treaty to demand the rendition of an American criminal who
escaped from the Consular jurisdiction and was found in Hong Kong; but it would be the duty of the Governor to strictly carry out the mode of procedure adopted in England of which perhaps the most important ele- ment is that the proof of the crime is submitted to the judicial investigation of a Magistrate: whose certificate of its sufficiency is an indispensable preliminary to the surrender of the fugitive.
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