13 1932
Law Report, Dec. 12
COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEAL
INFORMATION TO POLICE OF BOGUS CRIME A PUBLIC MISCHIEF
REX v. MANLEY
Before the LORD CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE AVORY, and MR. JUSTICE BRANSON
The COURT dismissed this appeal by Elizabeth Manley, who had been convicted at the Central "Criminal Court on November 18 of unlawfully effecting a public mischief. Sentence was post- poned by the Recorder, who granted a certificate for appeal on a point of law.
The case raised the important question whether a person who makes to the police a false state- ment with regard to an imaginary crime and causes the police to devote their time and ser- vices in the investigation of it commits the common law misdemeanour of doing an act tend- ing to effect a public mischief.
The indictment contained two counts. The first related to a statement made by the appel- lant to the police on September 10 to the effect that on that day a man, whose description she gave, had hit her with his fist and taken money and a receipt from her handbag. The second related to a similar statement made by her on September 15 to the effect that a man, whose description she gave, had come up from behind, struck her on the back, and taken a bag containing money from under her arm.
The Recorder, in giving judgment on the sub- mission made on behalf of the defendant that the indictment disclosed no offence known to the law, said: “ Upon the whole it is my clear view that this act is one which may tend to a public mischief. It would be intolerable that the services of our police force, already hard pressed to preserve law and order in a time of increasing lawlessness, should be deflected in order to follow up charges which are entirely bogus to the knowledge of those making them. In my view, taking the times you must con- sider the times in which we live-such an act may distinctly tend to the public mischief."
Mr. Laurence Vine appeared for the appel- lant: Mr. L. A. Byrne för the Crown.
Mr. VINE said that the question at issue was whether the indictment disclosed a criminal offence. Other similar cases had arisen at the last Hertfordshire Assizes, where Mr. Justice Hawke had to deal with two charges on similar facts, but adjourned those cases to the next Assizes in view of the fact that the present case was to be considered by the Court of Criminal Appeal. At the last Derbyshire Assizes there was a similar case, and Mr. Justice Humphreys suggested to the grand jury that they should ignore the bill and told them that no such offence was known to the law.
The LORD CHIEF JUSTICE.-The indictment there was framed under section 32 (1) of the Larceny Act, 1916. Mr. Justice Humphreys did not express any opinion that on the facts of the case before him a good indictment might not have been drawn for a common law misdemeanour.
Counsel referred to 2 East's Pleas of the Crown 821, and submitted that it was important that when this class of offence was there being considered, the words used were, "all frauds affecting the Crown." Here there was no fraud, and the appellant obtained nothing out of her stupid act.
MR. JUSTICE BRANSON.-May not fraud be independent of the object of the fraud?
Counsel then referred to R. v. Brailsford (21 ' The Times L.R., 727; [1905] 2 K.B., 730) and submitted that the public mischief which was held to constitute the offence was mischief of an international type. The charge there was one of conspiracy. In the present case at the highest the appellant had occupied some hours of a few police officers' time.
MR. JUSTICE BRANSON.-She also put in jeopardy anybody who happened to correspond with the description which she gave.
The LORD CHIEF JUSTICE.-The question is not whether the number of people likely to be affected is large or small, but what is the essence and nature of the act.
Mr. BYRNE said that it was clear both from a number of decisions and from the text-books that the offence of doing an act tending to effect a public mischief was one known to the law. The facts in the present case had not hitherto been put forward as amounting to public mischief, but the whole test was not how many of the King's subjects were affected by the act, but whether the act charged was one calculated to tend to produce public mischief.
Counsel referred to Stephen's Digest of Criminal Law, fourth edition, 108, R. v. Higgins (2 East's Rep., 5), R. v. Porter (26 The Times L.R., 200; [1910] 1 K.B., 369).
JUDGMENT
The LORD CHIEF JUSTICE, in giving the judgment of the Court, said that the case involved two questions. The first was whether it was true at the present day to say that there was a misdemeanour of committing an act tending to public mischief. In the opinion of the Court, that question was to be answered in the affirmative. The law remained as it had been stated in R. v. Higgins (supra):—“ All offences of a public nature, that is, all such acts or attempts as tend to the prejudice of the com- munity, are indictable." That case had been referred to with approval in Rex v. Brailsford (supra), and still more recently in Rex v. Porter (supra).
With regard to the second point, the facts were not in dispute, and it was admitted that what was alleged to have been done by the appellant had in fact been done. In the opinion of the Court, the indictment aptly described two at least of the ingredients of public mischief or prejudice to the community involved. First, that officers of the Metropolitan Police had been caused by false statements to devote their time to the investigation of an idle charge, and secondly, that members of the public, at any rate those answering or thought to answer a certain detailed description, had been put in peril.
For those reasons the Court was of opinion that the conviction must stand, and the appeal be dismissed.
Solicitors. Mr. C. Copley Singleton, Croydon; Director of Public Prosecutions.
** A full report of the judgment will appear in The Times Law Reports.
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