Copyright & Information

Alibi For A Judge

 

First published in 1960

© Estate Henry Cecil; House of Stratus 1960-2011

 

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

 

The right of Henry Cecil to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

 

This edition published in 2011 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,

Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

 

Typeset by House of Stratus.

 

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

 

 

This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author’s imagination.

Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

 

 

www.houseofstratus.com

About the Author

 

Judge Henry Cecil Leon was born in Norwood Green Rectory near London in 1902. In 1923 he was called to the Bar and from 1949 to 1967 he served as a County Court judge. He developed his writing skills whilst serving with the British Army during the Second World War, reputedly telling stories to officers at the behest of his colonel, so as to keep their minds off alcohol whilst sailing on ‘dry’ ships. These stories formed the basis of his first collection, Full Circle, published in 1948. Thereafter, the legal year, his impressions at court, or at other official functions, as well as dinners at the Savoy Grill or at his club, the Garrick, all provided material for his considerable brain power.

He wrote during the three-week-long family holidays which were usually spent in comfortable hotels in Britain. He would sit in a deck chair in a sunny garden, exercise book on lap and pen in hand, writing from 10 am to 1pm, then again from 2.30 to 4 pm each day.

Cecil had an extraordinary ability to examine the law in both a humorous and a more serious, analytical way, providing a series of thought provoking works.

Many of his stories have been made into films or plays - notably ‘Brothers-in-Law’ and ‘Alibi for a Judge’. These and other books have also provided a stimulus for those wishing to take up law as a career, although whilst dealing with the legal system they also have more than an element of the mystery/thriller genre about them. They are a delight for those who look for authenticity in the most aptly described British characters.

Cecil died in May 1976, still at the height of his mental powers.

CHAPTER ONE

On Alibis

 

William Burford’s defence was an alibi and the judge who presided at his trial was Mr Justice Carstairs. The alibi was not one of the best alibis and the judge was not one of the best judges. It may perhaps help to an understanding of the case and its curious consequences to consider first the nature of an alibi and then the nature of a judge.

From time immemorial the alibi as a defence has been popular with criminals. And not only with criminals. Most people remember Mr Weller senior’s despairing cry, ‘Oh, Sammy, Sammy, Vy worn’t there a alleybi?’ when Mrs Bardell won her action against Mr Pickwick. It is logical enough. The charge against William Burford was safe breaking on a pretty large scale. It was alleged that, with the help of another or others, he had not only blown open the safe but removed about £80,000 as well. No doubt William said to himself: ‘If I can prove I was elsewhere when the safe was blown, I’m bound to be acquitted.’ And he was quite right; it was a cast-iron defence – if it succeeded.

That is the trouble with alibis. They are at the same time the best and worst defences. They are the best because, if you weren’t there when the man was murdered, you couldn’t have murdered him. They are the worst because, once you raise an alibi, no other defence is usually open to you. In the case of murder, for example, you can’t rely on self-defence, accident or extreme provocation. You say you weren’t there. So you can’t have been provoked; you can’t have been threatened by the man and picked up a weapon with which to defend yourself; he can’t have slipped on a piece of orange skin and fallen accidentally on to the knife with which you were peeling the orange. You were nowhere near the man at the time. Or so you say. And, if the jury don’t believe you, that’s an end of the matter.

Criminal cases are not like civil cases in this respect. Judges and barristers are quite used to inconsistent and alternative defences in civil matters. Says the plaintiff in the County Court: ‘Your Honour, the defendant owes me £50 for goods sold and delivered.’

‘What do you say?’ says the judge to the defendant.

‘Oh, your Honour,’ says the defendant, ‘I never agreed to buy the goods.’

‘An excellent defence,’ says the judge. ‘Any other?’

‘Oh, yes, your Honour. He never delivered them to me.’

‘Better and better,’ says the judge. ‘Any more?’

‘Oh, yes, your Honour. They were no good and I couldn’t resell them.’

‘Yes,’ says the judge. ‘What’s the next one?’

‘He agreed to take them back.’

‘Fine,’ says the judge, ‘and now he refuses to do so?’

‘Exactly, your Honour,’ says the defendant. ‘And I’ve one further defence.’

‘I felt sure of it,’ says the judge. ‘Keep the best till the last. What is it?’

‘I’ve paid for them, your Honour.’

‘As I thought,’ says the judge. ‘How many children have you got?’

‘Five, your Honour.’

‘Very well, then. Pay £2 a month.’

Well, perhaps it isn’t quite like that, though, according to a current story, that is how it seemed to an American lawyer who was visiting the English Courts.

But, though this sort of thing can be done in a civil court, where the only issue is usually whether A should pay B and, if so, how much and when, it is quite impossible in a criminal court. For example, in William’s case it was alleged that he was seen running from the scene of the crime. Having sworn that at the time he was some miles away in bed with his wife, it would have been impossible for him to rely alternatively on the inconsistent defence that he was a customer of the bank and he had gone to sleep while waiting in a queue of people all of whom were paying in vast numbers of cheques and notes, which had to be counted and recounted; that, when the bank closed, he was somehow or other forgotten and locked in; that he was disturbed by the real thieves, that when he realised the position, he thought he might find himself in a compromising situation if he remained and so he bolted down the street. Nor, if that story seems anyway rather fantastic, could he have said more simply, as an alternative to his alibi, that he was certainly seen running from the scene but that it was a pure coincidence; he happened to be in the neighbourhood at the time and was in a hurry to get home.

No, once you’ve committed yourself to an alibi, that is your only mode of escape, and, if that breaks down, you must wait, as composedly as you can, for the sentence. In consequence the wise criminal thinks carefully before he relies on an alibi. And the wisest prepare it in advance, as in a military operation, with watches synchronised and excellent reasons arranged for the supporters of his alibi being able to remember the time when the accused was supposed to have been with them. Up to midnight the wireless is a most useful asset. The supporter listens to the programme and (provided the accused doesn’t get arrested on the spot) primes him with it later.

Many people are rather sceptical of alibis and, indeed, some cynics say that they are never genuine. They argue that, if the accused really was somewhere else at the time the crime was committed, he would never have been charged with it. But this implies that no innocent person is ever charged with crime, and, though it is a very rare occurrence, it does occasionally happen. William passionately declared that it had happened in his case.

CHAPTER TWO

On Judges

 

It should perhaps help to an understanding of Mr Justice Carstairs’ behaviour after the trial of William Burford to have some appreciation of a judge’s position in England.

How are they appointed, what qualities do they require to make them satisfactory judges, how and why do some of them fail to be satisfactory and what is the effect upon themselves and upon the public of such failure?

Mr Justice Carstairs had been appointed in the normal way, that is to say, he had had a substantial practice at the Bar, was looked upon as a sound lawyer and a person of complete integrity; he was offered the appointment by the Lord Chancellor, and he accepted. There was no surprise at his appointment and no expectation that he would either be very good or very bad.

In some countries there is a judges’ profession and, if you want to become a judge, rather than an advocate, you must join that profession. If you do join it, you no doubt start off in some administrative capacity with no judicial duties, but you see how the judges do their work. Then, in due course, you will be given some very minor judicial post, and your progress thereafter will presumably depend upon how you acquit yourself in that post and in any more important posts which you may be given.

The result is that no one in those countries is appointed to high judicial office unless he has proved himself to possess not only the qualities necessary for a good judge but the ability to make full use of those qualities as well. In consequence, the public in those countries can be almost certain that, unless the extra power suddenly goes to a man’s head, the judge holding high judicial office will be patient and fair-minded, intelligent, a good lawyer and, perhaps most important of all, not an advocate on the Bench. It can also be reasonably sure that he will not be a person who worries excessively. No one can, of course, be quite certain of that matter, as a judge may carry on his worrying entirely in private and never disclose it to any superiors, colleagues or subordinates, but this does not often happen.

It is, of course, possible that preferment to high judicial office will suddenly go to a man’s head, but, if he has been having continuous preferment for many years, it is fairly certain that he is not a person whom power corrupts.

The position of a High Court judge in England is extremely important and there is, therefore, obviously something to be said for ensuring that no one is appointed to that office unless he has proved himself to be fitted for it. A man may be a brilliant lawyer and a brilliant advocate and an appallingly bad judge. And you cannot tell for certain what sort of a judge he will make until he is on the Bench. If a mistake has been made, it is then too late to correct it.

In spite of this danger the English system of the appointment of judges entirely from the Bar has worked, on the whole, extremely satisfactorily, but undoubtedly it has fallen down from time to time. It was a mistake to appoint Mr Justice Carstairs, though neither he nor anyone else realised it at the time. But the advantage of the system is that the judge, having been at the Bar most of his working life, understands all that has been happening before the case comes into Court and all that is happening from the advocate’s point of view in Court. This knowledge is of the greatest value and is only available to judges in those countries where they are appointed from the Bar.

The one case where the English system has in the past been known quite unnecessarily to fail has been in the appointment of the Lord Chief Justice. His position is of the greatest importance, both to the judges and to the public, but until comparatively recently there was a practice by which he was appointed direct from the Bar, the Attorney-General of the day being considered to have some kind of moral right to be so appointed. The strong probability is that this practice is now defunct and that no Lord Chief Justice of England will ever be appointed except from among the judges themselves. It would seem elementary that no one should be appointed to such high office unless he has proved that he is a judge of the highest quality. The unfortunate result of appointing as Lord Chief Justice an Attorney-General, who was a man of brilliant ability in many respects but whose judicial qualities had never been tested, and were in fact dreadfully deficient, is well within the memory of many lawyers, and it is unlikely that such a risk will ever be taken again. It was necessary to take a risk in appointing Mr Justice Carstairs a judge of the Queen’s Bench Division. It would have been ludicrous to take the risk of making him Lord Chief Justice. How ludicrous this story will show.

No little handbook entitled Do’s and Don’ts for Judges is issued to barristers on their appointment to the Bench. Most of them realise instinctively what is required of them. Even those who do not turn out to be particularly good judges try to act as particularly good judges do act. This has the advantage that on the whole litigants feel that justice has been done, even if it hasn’t, and apparent justice is the next best thing to justice itself. Nor do newly appointed judges attend a short course of lectures with the object of receiving helpful advice from their more experienced brethren.

All the same, a class for new judges is a pleasant idea.

‘Now, Toothcombe J, what would you do in a case where the plaintiff said, etc, etc?’

Toothcombe J remains deep in thought.

‘Come along, Toothcombe J, one of the things a judge has to do is to make up his mind.’

Still no answer.

‘Very well then. Next. Next. Next. I see your hand is up, Blinkers J. What is your answer to the problem?’

‘I was just stretching, I’m afraid.’

‘Oh, very well. So long as it was a genuine yawn, I don’t think it matters very much. But never do it on purpose.’

But, although handbooks and lectures are quite unnecessary for the average judge, it would have been a good thing if Mr Justice Carstairs could have had the advantage of both. For, although in private life he was a kindly and generous man, he was one of the few judges who did not appreciate instinctively his responsibilities, or realise how easy it was to abuse the power vested in him.

An omnibus conductor has considerable authority in his omnibus. He can’t tell people to take their hands out of their pockets or to stop sucking sweets but he can order people about to a substantial extent. Few conductors abuse this power but some do. Such abuses cannot do much harm, although they can start an unfortunate train of events moving. If a conductor is rude to a businessman, it may rankle until he reaches his office. He may find there that a clerk has made a mistake. Normally he would have overlooked it, but, unconsciously, in order to be avenged for the conductor’s rudeness, he creates a fuss about it all and makes some unwarranted remarks to the clerk. Eventually the clerk is provoked into answering back and is given a week’s notice. This may lead to all sorts of domestic complications.

‘Lost your job, have you? What am I going to use for housekeeping, tell me that?’

‘It wasn’t my fault, really, Mary.’

No, it wasn’t. It was the conductor’s.

So, even the abuse of authority on that very small scale can have serious effects. And, conversely, good manners and helpful conduct, even on a small scale, can start a chain reaction of a happier kind.

But abuse of power by a judge may very well have serious effects. It is one thing for a man to be told in public to get off an omnibus, it is quite another for a judge to say of him in public, with the probability that it will be reported in the press: ‘I have never seen such a nauseating spectacle as Mr X in the witness box. He is incapable of telling the truth except when it suits him and he tells his lies in a sanctimonious and self-righteous manner which I find utterly repulsive.’

When Mr Justice Carstairs, on his way home from Court, read in the newspaper ‘Mr X … a nauseating spectacle. Judge,’ he entirely failed to appreciate that in speaking of Mr X in that way he had simply satisfied his own personal dislike of the man. For the purposes of his decision it was quite unnecessary for him to do more than to say that he did not accept Mr X’s evidence and why: for example, that some of his evidence was contrary to letters which he had written or that he contradicted himself in the witness box or the like. But to describe him as a nauseating hypocrite was to indulge in mere abuse. Perhaps the judge was right in this view, perhaps he was not, but, though his judgment could be reversed in a higher Court, his words could never become unspoken.

And, after all, he had seen the man in the box for perhaps an hour. It may be that in the unaccustomed atmosphere of the Court Mr X went to pieces and did not do himself justice. It is indeed surprising that so many witnesses are able to control themselves sufficiently to appear outwardly calm. Justice can never be perfect and, if a man is a bad witness, he may lose his case, but he should not have to suffer the sort of treatment which Mr Justice Carstairs handed out. And unfortunately no one who knew the judge well enough ever told him of this defect in his behaviour. It was as bad as that of a judge who said to an acquitted prisoner: ‘You’re discharged. You’re very lucky in your jury.’

In saying that, the judge had endeavoured to cast doubt upon the jury’s verdict in order to satisfy his own sense of annoyance at the prisoner being acquitted.

A further serious fault of Mr Justice Carstairs was his complete inability to restrain himself from intervening during the course of a case. Everyone knows the man who can’t refrain from taking the lead in private conversation. If a story, which he happens to know, is being told, he can’t resist interrupting and finishing it off. So with Mr Justice Carstairs in Court. It has frequently been said that a judge should hold himself aloof from the struggle going on in Court between the advocates. Of course sometimes he has to blow his whistle when there has been an infringement of the rules, or when someone has been hurt, but otherwise he should leave the battle to the advocates. Mr Justice Carstairs, however, girded himself for war and joined lustily in the fight.

Another of his serious faults was to have carried his advocacy to the Bench. That is one of the prices of the system of appointing judges solely from advocates. But it is impossible to tell whether a man will do this until you see him at work on the Bench. It by no means follows that, because a man has been a fierce and determined advocate, he will not be completely fair-minded on the Bench. One even finds such an advocate, on appointment to the Bench, having difficulty in coming to a decision. But the judge who carries his advocacy to the Bench makes up his mind (often much too early) as to what in his opinion the result of the case should be and proceeds to press that point of view, just as though he were the advocate whose duty it was to press it. A judge cannot help forming a view about a case as it goes on; that is what he is there for. But, as far as possible, he should keep it to himself and in no circumstances should he try to steer the case to the result which he considers it should have. A judge who apparently seems to procure a particular result in a case must invariably appear unfair.

It was unfortunate that Mr Justice Carstairs should have these faults but by themselves they would only have resulted in his being a bad judge. It was the combination of these faults with two other faults which caused him to act so strangely. He was a worrier and he indulged in self-deception.

It is important for a judge, both for his own peace of mind and for the quality of his decisions, that he should not worry about them. He should do his very best to get them right, but, having done so and delivered his judgments, he should not be tormented by doubts about their correctness. A judge should be able to make up his mind and, having done so, he should give his decision and go to the theatre.

There was once a judge who had many admirable judicial qualities but he worried so much about his cases that he actually died within a comparatively short time of his appointment, because his mind and body could not stand the strain any more. Mr Justice Carstairs did not die from worry but this can only have been because his mind and body were both able to stand the strain better than the judge who died. But he tormented himself unmercifully when he had any doubt about a decision he had given.

He also indulged in self-deception. Most young barristers have done this in their early days. The young man loses a case in a County Court, and on his way back from the trial suddenly thinks of something which he failed to do and which might have altered the whole situation. For a moment he feels quite sick, and then he starts to convince himself either that his new idea was not in fact a good one, or that it would really have made no difference if he had put it into effect. Before he has got back to chambers he has decided that no one else could have won the case, although in his heart of hearts he knows this is not true. Most young men grow out of this habit, and start to learn to profit by their mistakes. They still find on the way back from Court that they’ve forgotten to ask an essential question or something of that kind, but they no longer try to convince themselves that it would have made no difference. In other words they seek to profit from holding a post-mortem and they resolve to try to do better in the future.

In its strict sense an alibi means a claim that you were elsewhere at the time something happened. But the word is also used loosely and inaccurately to mean simply an excuse. In that sense Mr Justice Carstairs had from the start of his career at the Bar used alibis and on his way home from Court, after having given judgment in a rather difficult case, he would suddenly think of some point that he thought he might have overlooked. Thereupon the worrying side of his mind and his power of self-deception would have a fine struggle and by the time he reached home he would have decided that he was right after all. That, however, would not prevent him from having a very bad night through worrying about it all over again.

But for the explanation of how judges are appointed readers might have wondered how this particular judge came to be appointed. But he was quite a good lawyer and some of the faults which made him unqualified to be a judge were not appreciated when he was only an advocate. They were not even appreciated by the judge himself. Had they been, he would never have accepted the offer. There is a considerable strain on a judge imposed by the mere concentration which he has to maintain throughout the case. But, if he has serious difficulty in coming to a conclusion on any but the simplest cases, and if he continually worries after most of his decisions and is only stopped by having to concentrate on the next case, the burden is too great for him.

A man once said to a judge: ‘If you make that order I shall commit suicide.’

The judge made the order and the man committed suicide. Had such an event occurred to Mr Justice Carstairs he might conceivably have committed suicide himself; but, even if he had refrained from taking that drastic step, he would have undergone torments. In fact the judge had no alternative but to make the order. He reported the threat to all the responsible authorities and there was no more that he could do. If a judge were to yield in any way to such a threat, any litigant could win his case by making it, as no one could ever tell whether he really meant it. Of course it wouldn’t last very long with that particular judge, as very soon both sides would make the same threat and it would become common form for counsel for the plaintiff, having asked all the relevant questions material to the case, to add this last one before sitting down: ‘And now, Mr Y, will you kindly tell the learned judge what you will do if he does not decide in your favour?’

‘I shall commit suicide.’

‘Thank you, Mr Y. That is all I have to ask.’

Then counsel for the defendant would do exactly the same and the threats would pretty well cancel out. Of course it might be awkward when there was a claim and a counter-claim and the judge dismissed them both. No doubt in such a case he would warn both plaintiff and defendant that it would be a serious contempt of Court to put their threat into practice within the precincts of the Court.

Fortunately for William Burford he had no idea of the nature of the judge who was going to try him. He had indeed asked his counsel what the judge was like and had received the assurance: ‘Don’t you worry about the judge. It’s the jury that matters.’

CHAPTER THREE

Trial

 

It was more comforting for William to be told that than to be told: ‘He’s the very devil and will get you convicted if he possibly can.’

And that was the only reason that William’s counsel, Mr Empton, said what he did. He was an able and experienced practitioner in the Criminal Courts and he knew perfectly well that in a difficult case, like William’s, he would have the judge against him. It follows from what has been said earlier that a judge should not be ‘against’ anyone when a man is being tried by a jury. And, even when he is trying a civil case alone, he should not appear to be against either side until he gives his judgment. But Mr Empton knew well that, unless he were extremely lucky, Mr Justice Carstairs would run the case against him from start to finish, and that, though the verdict would be the jury’s, it might well be difficult for them in a case of this kind to withstand the pressure from the Bench. But there was no point in worrying his client unduly in advance by telling him this. He had enough to worry about as it was.

It was well known among lawyers that, when something starts to go wrong with a case, it often happens that nearly everything seems to go wrong. Usually, though not quite always, this is because the case is a bad one. William’s case began badly and got worse as it went on. It started with a bad judge, it was dependent on a poor alibi, something happened in the course of the case which made the alibi even worse, and throughout the case the judge and Mr Empton were at loggerheads. William soon became like a passenger on a sinking ship. The captain (Empton) was on the bridge doing his best but the waves were battering the boat unmercifully, it was taking in water all the time and, though, of course, a rescue was always possible, it appeared to William at almost every stage of the trial that he was going down. The captain, of course, would not have to go down with his ship.

The first witness against William was a policeman. At about 11.30pm he had been on beat duty near a branch of a well-known bank when he heard what sounded like a muffled explosion. He stopped and listened but heard nothing more, and saw nothing. He thought it must have been the sound of a collision in the distance. After standing still for a minute or two, he continued on his beat. About twenty minutes later he heard a sound of someone running. Turning round a corner he saw a man running and carrying a suitcase. He called on him to stop. The man glanced round and increased his pace. The policeman followed, but lost him. Later he identified William as the man he had seen.

Mr Empton had a difficult decision to make when he rose to cross-examine the policeman. The witness had admittedly only seen the man’s face for a moment, but he had unquestionably picked him out at an identification parade. As far as William could tell, this parade was a perfectly fair one. But – and it was a very big but – some eight years previously William had unfortunately served a sentence of six months’ imprisonment for receiving goods knowing them to have been stolen. Since his release from prison he had apparently gone straight. He had married a charming girl and taken a steady job and, as far as was known, had avoided the bad company he had been keeping at the time of his conviction.

In consequence of this conviction, however, the police had a photograph of William. If the witness had been shown this photograph before the identification it would be easy enough for him to pick out William. It might have been shown to him perfectly properly with other photographs, before William’s arrest, to see if he could spot the man. On the other hand, it might have been shown to him after William’s arrest, in an excess of zeal by the police who, believing that William was their man, wanted to secure a conviction. On the whole it was most unlikely that it was shown to the witness before the arrest, as William had never been concerned in safe blowing or anything of that sort. But Mr Empton’s difficulty was that any cross-examination by him to suggest that the witness had seen a photograph of the accused might very well lead an intelligent member of the jury to realise that William had a previous conviction for crime. Mr Empton did not consider that this was one of those rare cases where it was desirable to rely upon the fact that the accused had a criminal record, and accordingly he was in a dilemma. The policeman positively identified William. It was no use simply shouting at him that he was a liar or asking if he had made a mistake. The policeman would politely deny such suggestions. On the other hand, the only method of making an inroad on the identification was by referring to a matter which might gravely prejudice his client’s chances of acquittal. He also had to bear in mind that, if the witness had been deliberately shown a photograph of William before the parade, it was most unlikely that he would admit it. So that all he might get for his pains would be a statement that there was such a photograph in existence – which would be a pointer to a previous conviction – and a denial that the policeman had ever seen it.

Such a situation requires the most delicate handling and even the most brilliant and intelligent advocate might take a wrong course or come to grief when taking the right one. Mr Empton’s cross-examination went as follows:

 

Empton: You only caught a glimpse of his face, Officer?

Witness: I saw it, sir.

Empton: I know you saw it, but it was only for a moment, wasn’t it?

Witness: It was only for a moment but I saw it plainly.

Empton: Have you a good memory for faces?

Witness: Average, I suppose, sir.

Empton: You didn’t see the prisoner in the police station until five days after you saw the man running?

Witness: That is correct.

Empton: Had you been trying to memorise his face in the meantime?

Witness: Yes, sir, I had.

Empton: How d’you do that?

Witness: Well, I just did it, sir. It struck me as very suspicious that a man carrying a suitcase refused to stop when called upon by me, and I tried to keep his face in mind.

Empton: Not an easy thing to do?

Witness: I don’t know, sir. I’ve never really tried to do it before.

Empton: When did you first give information about this man?

Witness: I reported it immediately on the telephone, sir. And later that night, when I heard of the bank robbery, I made a further report.

Empton: Did you have any difficulty in identifying the accused at the parade?

Witness: I had to look along the line of men twice, sir, and then I felt sure.

Empton: Did you have any help in identifying him?

Judge:    What d’you mean – have any help?

Empton: My Lord, I would respectfully ask your Lord-ship to allow me to ask the question without intervening.

Judge:    But the jury and the witness and I must know what you mean by the question. You say ‘did he have help?’ Help could be given in a variety of ways.

Empton: My Lord, I’m sure your Lordship must realise the difficulties which counsel sometimes have in this type of cross-examination.

Judge:    Some cases are very difficult.

Empton: My Lord, I do most respectfully protest at that observation, and I ask for a new trial before a fresh jury.

Judge:    Certainly not. Go on with your cross-examination.

Empton: Well, Officer, did you have any help?

Judge:    What d’you mean by ‘help’? Do you mean – was the prisoner pointed out to the witness before he went on the parade? Is that what you mean? I’ll ask the officer myself. Did that happen, Officer?

Witness: No, my Lord.

Judge:    Is that what you meant, Mr Empton?

Empton: No, my Lord.

Judge:    Then kindly explain what you do mean.

Empton: I wish your Lordship would let me ask the question.

Judge:    It’s no good you asking the question unless the witness knows what it means. Do you know what it means, Officer?

Witness: No, my Lord.

 

It would have taken a particularly scrupulous and courageous policeman to reply to that last question: ‘Yes, perfectly, my Lord.’ Whether such a witness would have become a Chief Constable, Commissioner of Police, or have eventually been dismissed as unsuitable for the police force, is a matter for conjecture.