CO129-584-14 Commutation of death sentences to life imprisonment. Includes 9 photographs depicting- [CN 3-42] Commutation of... 22-12-1939 - 17-9-1940 — Page 75

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Now, since we adjourned a few minutes before one

I have been thinking how best I could give you in simple

and yet compendious form the law applicable to this case,

because my task is more difficult than it otherwise might

have been, for it will be my duty, painful or otherwise,

to explode in the course of my charge on the law, certain

of Mr. Chen's apparently pet theories which are not in my

judgment, legally well founded.

As I say, I have been thinking it over and the

conclusion that I have come to is that the simplest way

to put the law before you would be to give you a necessary

and perhaps happily very brief resume of the story as it

is told first by the witnesses for the prosecution and

secondly by the prisoner himself and then apply the law

to the different possibilities that emerge from those two

stories. That I think will give us the complete review

of all the legal possibilities in this case and will, I

trust, give us an intelligible one that is easy for all

of us to understand. And so gentlemen, at the risk of

being tiresome and reiterative we go back again to the

story we have heard almost ad nauseum from witnesses for

the Crown and witnesses for the accused all yesterday and

today.

The story of course begins with a small boy, Chan Kam

On. Unlike so many of us he had been not only naughty but

lucky. Having tried a little gambling in his immature years

he had come out on the right side, and that of course is

one of the worst things that can happen to any young people;

so it was not a bad thing that he had to wait a whole year

for his money.

When that year was over the thought "Well,

this is foolish - the prisoner owes me 50 cents and I see

no reason why I should not have it," so he began to dig