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227.

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

T། ། །། །།

سنس

Reference :-

C.O.

· 885

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-

COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

No. 132.

(SAINT LUCIA.)

LAW OFFICERS to FOREIGN OFFICE.

Temple, September 3, 1862. MY LORD,

We are honoured with your Lordship's commands, signified in Mr. Layard's letter of the 13th August ultimo, stating that he was directed by your Lordship to transmit to us a correspondence as marked in the margin which had taken place between your Lordship's Department, the Colonial Office, and the French Ambassador at this Court, on the subject of the extradition demanded by the Governor of Mar- tinique from the Administrator of Saint Lucia of certain persons accused of crimes coming under the Extradition Treaty of the 13th February 1843 between this country and France.

Mr. Layard was also pleased to state that we should perceive that in one of the three cases in question, that of Léandre Sauvignon, charged with fraudulent bank- ruptcy, the accused was actually arrested under a warrant issued by the British Colonial authorities, but that the question having arisen whether such arrest was authorised by any local law of St. Lucia, the Attorney General expressed his doubts that any such authority existed, and the prisoner was accordingly liberated. And that he was directed by your Lordship to request that we would take these papers into our consideration and furnish your Lordship with our opinion as to the law laid down by the Attorney General of Saint Lucia in this matter.

In obedience to your Lordship's commands, we have taken these papers into our consideration, and have the honour to

Report

That, assuming as we must do on the authority of the Attorney General of St. Lucia, that fraudulent bankruptcy is not an offence by the lex loci, we are of opinion that the Governor of the Colony had no legal power, and was not called upon, under the Treaty of Extradition between Great Britain and France of the 13th of February 1843, to deliver up the person against whom the charge alleged was that of fraudulent bankruptcy. By the terms of the Treaty and of the Act giving it force (6 & 7 Viot. o. 75.) the offence is to be "so established that the laws of the country where the fugitive or person so accused should be found would justify his apprehension and "commitment for trial, if the crime had been there committed." This clause un- doubtedly provides for the nature and amount of the evidence to be adduced; but in our opinion it goes farther, and in effect requires that the offence for which extradition may be demanded shall be an offence under the laws of each of the two countries.

LC

The Earl Russell, K.G., &c. &c. &c.

We have, &c. (Signed) WM. ATHERTON.

ROUNDELL PALMER.

o 16378.-216.

25.-2/66,