614881-1930-Supplementary-Bills-read-a-first-time- — Page 18

may

749

Objects and Reasons.

1. Section 2 of this Ordinance restores a sub-section which was omitted from section 5 of the principal Ordinance (No. 9 of 1899) when the Ordinances were revised in 1923. The sub-section in question was one which gave the Chief Justice power to order a special criminal session in addition to the ordinary sessions. The sub-section was probably omitted in reliance on the proviso at the end of section 77 (2) of the Magis- trates Ordinance, 1890, which provides that "the court ..........order the accused to be tried on such date as the court may fix". Probably this gives sufficient power to fix any date for the trial of a case committed to the criminal sessions, but it is arguable that it only gives power to fix some date within some actual criminal session of the court. Further if a case is tried on some date which is not within any actual criminal session, ordinary or special, provided by Ordinance or directed by the Chief Justice, the usual rule as to commence- ment of a sentence, i.e., that it dates from the first day of the session, is inapplicable For these reasons it has been decided to restore the sub-section in question

2. Sections 12 and 13 of the principal Ordinance, give the Attorney General power in certain cases to refer a committed case back to the magistrate for further inquiry or to be dealt with summarily. Section 14 gives the magistrate power in that event to direct the Superintendent of Prisons to bring up the prisoner before him, but it makes no provision for the com- munication to the Superintendent of Prisons of the Attorney General's direction. Section 3 of this Ordi- nance corrects this slight defect.

3. Sub-section (2) of section 17 of the principal Ordi- nance provides that when the Attorney General declines to file an indictment against any person committed for trial he may issue a warrant in a certain form to the Registrar, who must thereupon issue an order to the officer in whose custody the person is, directing him to discharge the accused from custody in respect of the offence mentioned in the order. The sub-section in question takes no account of the case in which an accused person is admitted to bail. Section 4 of this Ordinance accordingly adds a few words to the sub- section so as to meet the point.

4. It sometimes happens that an accused person is not indicted on the charge on which he was committed for trial but on some other charge. It also sometimes happens that an accused person is committed for trial on several charges and that only some of these charges are made the subject of an indictment. Sections 5 and 6 of this Ordinance amend sections 30 and 31 of the principal Ordinance so as to provide machinery for giving early information to the Superintendent of Prisons in any such case. It seems desirable that this information should be given to the Superintendent of Prisons, although he obtains it in another way at the end of the criminal sessions for the month in question.

5. Section 7 of this Ordinance amends section 52 of the principal Ordinance so as to give the court a dis- cretion as to the acceptance of a plea of guilty in capital cases. Persons have been known to plead guilty to offences which they could not have committed (R. v Verney. 2 Cr. App. R. 107). Again some persons might plead guilty in one of those border-line cases where on hearing the whole evidence a jury might bring in a verdict of manslaughter. Moreover a similar discretion is given elsewhere (e.g. Ceylon Ordinance No. 15 of 1898, s. 220).