CO129-376 - Governor Sir Lugard - 1911 [3-4] — Page 492

479

ARB

obtaining a prima facie case for extradition the Canton

Government only applies for extradition in cases of very

serious crime. The result in practice is that the Magistrate

whose powers are in all other cases strictly circumscribed

and who remands important cases for trial in the Supreme

Court knows that in all extradition cases his recommendation

to the Governor for extradition (on the grounds that a prima

facie case has been made out) is tantamount to a sentence of

九 death. It is a curious and interesting testimony to the case

with which these cases have been conducted, that the Chinese

Government while lately restricting the Provincial Courts

from inflicting the death penalty without prior review of the

case by the Peking Authorities in all cases except those in

which the Criminal was caught in flagrante delicto, added to

this last class all prisoners extradited from Hongkong. If,

however, it were understood and practically demonstrated

of in hadilice

that extradition of prisoners would not necessarily be

decapitated, and application were made for the extradition of

persons accused of some of the lesser crimes set out in

schedule 1 of Ordinance 7 of 1889 while the Hongkong Magis-

-trate was assured that they would be punished by a lesser

penalty