Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/118

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NOTES AND QUERIES.

[12 S. I. FEB. 5, 1916.

There is a form of the Recorder's warrant in the Appendix to vol. iv. of Blackstone. In the first year of her reign Parliament rendered it unnecessary for this report to be presented to the Queen. The statute 7 W. IV. and 1 Viet, c. 77, enacted :

" That from and after the passing of this Act it shall not be necessary that any Report should be made to Her Majesty, Her Heirs and Successors, in the case of any Prisoner convicted before the Central Criminal Court, and now under sentence of death, or who maybe hereafter convicted before such Court and sentenced to the like Punishment, previously to such sentence being carried into execution."

This assimilated the practice of the C.C.C. to the other courts of criminal judica- ture, viz., the Crown Courts on circuit, No report of death sentences passed in such court was reported to the King, as in the cases sentenced at the C.C.C.

Stephen, in his ' History of the Criminal Law,' vol. ii. p. 88, says that when the Recorder's report was made to the King in Council the King was always personally present, and he adds :

" The list of persons capitally convicted was on these occasions carefully gone through, and the question who Avas and who was not to be executed was considered and decided."

One reason for altering the practice was

" because it would have been indecent and practically impossible to discuss with a woman the details of many crimes then capital."

MR. ACKERMANN assumes that there wag a practice for the King to sign death warrants for the execution of criminals, and there is, I think, a general belief that this was at one time usual. In Harrison Ainsworth's ' Tower of London ' there is an illustration by Cruikshank of Queen Mary signing the death warrant for the execution of Lady Jane Grey and her husband. No reference is made to this practice in Blackstone, in Stephen's ' History of the Criminal Law,' in Ghitty's ' Criminal Law,' or in any textbook to which I have referred. Blackstone, chap, xxxii., ' Of Execution,' says that the warrant '* was antiently by precept under the hand and seal of the judge." The practice now is for the judge to sign the calendar made up by the Clerk of Assize, which the judge first carefully examines with his notebook.

Even in a case where a sentence of death has been passed in the High Court of Parliament before his Majesty, the sentence is always put in force by a writ from the King under the Great Seal of Great Britain, but the King does not sign such writ, See the form

of this writ in the case of Earl Ferrers, 19 ' State Trials,' 974.

I have been dealing with the general practice in ordinary capital cases, and with the death warrant which went to the sheriff. In the case of Mary, Queen of Scots :

" Queen Elizabeth, after so me hesitation, having delivered a Writing to Davison, one of her Secretaries, signed with her own hand, command- ing a warrant under the Great Seal of England to be drawn up for the Execution, which was to be in readiness in case of any dangerous Attempt upon Queen Elizabeth, commanded him to acquaint no man therewith," &c. 1 'State Trials,' 1207.

HABRY B. POLAND.

Inner Temple.

The " death warrant " is, in fact, an order for execution made out by the Clerk of Assize of the Circuit at which the offender is capitally convicted (or, at the Central Criminal Court, by the Clerk of the Court, I believe). It is signed by the Clerk of Assize, and proceeds : " Whereas at this present sessions of Gaol Delivery, A. B. is and stands convicted of Murder (or other capital felony), It is thereupon ordered and adjudged by this Court," &c. (proceeding to set out the terms of the sentence, and concluding " By the Court, J. S., Clerk of Assize"). This is delivered by the Clerk of Assize to the head warder of the gaol in which such offender is confined, together with a copy of the Judge's Calendar, also signed by the Clerk of Assize, in which will appear, in his due place in the Calendar according to his number : " No. (say) 5. A. B. Guilty of murder. To be hanged."

The warder and the Clerk of Assize, or his deputy, examine the Calendar signed by the judge with the copy signed by the clerk, to see that they in all respects agree, and the order for execution and copy of the Calendar constitute the sheriff's authority to execute the malefactor.

I do not know that in ordinary crime any other practice has been followed. Until the accession of Queen Victoria, the King in Council did, so far as the Old Bailey Sessions were concerned, personally consider the commutation of sentences ; but even those who were left for execution in the ' Recorder's Report ' were often reprieved by the Secre- tary of State. I do not know if the King personally signed the ' Recorder's Report,' but at all events his Majesty did not sign any execution orders in respect of capital convictions on circuit.

Under one special statute, sentence o death was not passed by the Recorder at the end of the Sessions, but was awarded in ther