The Sun.
London, England, 1847-10-12 00:00:00

In their defence the prisoners declared that this was
all a :story concocted by the police, who had been the
aggressors. They were standing by the church,
Wishing each other good night, as they had to go in
iifferent directions, when police-constable K 308
Came up and pushed between them, and. told them to
move on. They replied they were going; when he
said, " Yes, I'll make you go," and kicked them. Two
more policemen came running up, and K 310 knocked
Thomas. Thomson to the ground and then kicked
lle lay on the pavement and groaned murder,
-and the policeman kicked him in the face. The other
two policemen seized his brother, Edward Thomson,
and twisted his arms and also kicked him.
At the station•house they complained of the treat-
ment they had suffered, and exhibited their bruises
to the sergeant who took the charge. This narrative
'was given in a very connected and straightforward
manner, and although closely questioned by the
magistrate, they persisted to the minutest particular
in t:neir statement.

The sergeant who took the charge, K 32, was sent
far, and, on his arrival, said the prisoners had com-
plained of the ill usage they had received, and
'Thomas Thomson showed a bruise on his right cheek.
They were both drunk.
The three policemen were recalled, and on their
oaths denied the prisoners' statement. K 310 said
Thomas Thomson, when he came up, was lying on
Ins back on the pavement, crying murder and police,
and complained of a policeman kicking him in a
cowardly manner, but there was no one near him.
Mr. YARDLEY could not admit the unsupported
statement of two drunken men against the oaths of
the three policemen. If the prisoners' statement
were true, the officers had not only been guilty of
most outrageous and brutal conduct, but of gross
perjury ; if not, the defence was a most wicked one.
e should fine Edward Thomson, 305., or ten days'
Imprisonment, and John Thomson, 205., or seven
days' imprisonment.
They were locked up in default.

REGISTRATIONS.-(THIS DAY.)
CITY OF LONDON.

(Before Mr. T. Y. APCHRISTIE, Esq.)
At the commencement of the proceedings of this
Court,
Mr. M'CIIRISTIE delivered the following decision,
with respect to the question of the rights of persons
to be placed on the register, residing on premises in
Which the landlord also resides
LANDLORD AND LODGER.
In the case of Moses Toms, of No. 21, Milton-
street, in the parish of- St. Giles-without, Cripplegate,
the question arose whether the claimant was to be
considered an occupier within the meaning of the
act, entitled to vote in respect of certain rooms
which he occupies. The facts of his case are these :
He has occupied for a year and three-quarters the
first floor, consisting of two rooms, of the house in
which he lives, at a rent of ss. 6d. a week. His
landlord occupies the shop and parlour on the ground
floor, but does not sleep there (as the claimant states),
nor has he a servant who sleeps in the house. Three
other parties occupy apartments in the house. There
is but one outer door to the house, by which the
landlord, in common with all the inmates, has ingress
and exit. The landlord, the claimant, and the other
three inmates have respectively a key of the outer door,
and they all lock or unlock that door when and as they
please. The door is never barred or fastened inside
at night ; there is neither bolt or chain to it ; it
stands open during the day. The landlord's shop
door is inside the passage, which passage the claim-
ant has to pass along to get to the staircase that leads
up to his apartments, and which staircase is shut off
from the passage by a swing door. There is a back
kitchen at the end of the passage, in which there is
a cistern for water, and from which all parties in the
house are supplied with water. The outer door is
opened in the morning by the party who has occasion
first, and locked at night by whoever has last occa-
sion, either to enter or to leave the house. Now,
where a landlord resides—that is to say, occupies,
by himself or his family, a part of his house day
and night, letting off other parts of the same
house to other parties, there being but one outer
door leading into the house, which is used by the
landlord in common with all the inmates who oc-
cupy there, it is clear that until there shall be
an alteration in the present view of the law, that land-
lord is the occupier of that house, and the other parties
occuping parts of the same house are not entitled to
be registered in respect of such their respective
occupations. Mr. Smith and Mr. Brown both admit
that to be the law ; but Mr. Smith says it has not yet
been decided by the Court of Common Pleas, that
where a landlord occupies a part of his house for the
purposes of his business, during the daytime only,
and does not sleep there, all the other circumstances
of disqualification as to others in the same house ex-
isting, that that disqualifies the other inmates. He,
therefore, contends that in this case Moses Toms is
titled to be registered, and wishes, if I should be of
opinion against him, to have a case upon that point
to the court of appeal. Now to be an occupier,
entitled to vote, the party claiming must have the
exclusive and independent occupation of the house,
Premises, or apartments, in respect of which he
claims to be registered ; and can he have that unless
he has the exclusive control over the outer door,
through which he must enter to get into his castle ?
Thr law says he cannot. Here the claimant has not
the sole control over the outer door; but Mr. Smith
argues that he, the landlord, and three other inmates
have each, and that every one of them has the exclu-
sive possession of and control over the outer door, in
that they have each a key to it. I can understand
how it might be said that a number of persons
in a corporate cr co-partnery character or
capacity might each have an exclusive possession
of one particular outer door leading into a given
house ; but how five different persons, totally distinct
from and altogether unconnected with each other, in
any transaction or character whatever, except sustain-
ing the relation of tenant and landlord, can each have
an exclusive possession of the one outer door, through
which all must enter—how five separate and distinct
possessions are nevertheless one possession, and though
one, yet five, is what I cannot very easily compre-
hend, as applied to human affairs. But to show that
that is so, and to establish it, Mr. Smith refers me,
amongst others, to the case of Bryan Kearney, decided
in Ireland, and which, to be sure, he calls the Irish
case. The decision in that case cannot govern the pre-
sent. The facts of the case are not at all alike ; but
there are important dicta in the judgment given in Bryan
Kearney's case, all conclusive against Mr. Smith's
views of the present case. The learned Judge there
says, the claimant must show that that which he
seeks to be registered in respect of " is in his own
exclusive occupation ;" and his Lordship goes on—
" But he must also show that he is not dependent
upon the good will or leave of another for any cir-
cumstance necessary to the full, free, and exclusive
enjoyment of his house; or, in other words, he must
command the entrance to it and the exit from it. To
effect this latter object he must have an exclusive
right to, and control over, the outer door of his
house ; if he have not, his occupation cannot be con-
sidered as an exclusive occupation, since it will be
in the power of some other person to disturb his
possession without being a trespasser. The ques-
tion then, in this case, is, has the claimant, upon
the evidence, shown an exclusive right to the •uter
door ?" And I ask here, has Moses Toms " shown
an exclusive right to the outer door ?" lle
has shown that his landlord, and three other parties
besides himself, have a key of the outer door, which
be must enter and go out at, and with which they
may all lock and unlock that door evey day, or at any
hour any night. In the Irish case the claimant was
the occupier of a shop, to which he entered through
an outer door that led into a hall, and from which
there was a door into his shop. The outer door of
that hall was kept open all day. Another party oc-
cupied another part of the house, who had also to
enter his apartments through the same outer door
which opened into the hall, and both the claimant and
that other party had a key of the hall outer door ;
but the landlord had no key of that outer door,
nor of any door belonging to the house, nor does
it appear from the case that the landlord had
ever even seen the house; whereas here the land-
lord occupies the lower part of the house—he
has his goods and furniture there—he is there
every day—he has a key—he enters when he pleases,
and although the claimant says he does not sleep
there, yet there is nothing to prevent him from enter-
ing at any hour of the night, or from sleeping there
if he should think it well to do so. And, therefore,
the cases, as I have said, do not appear to me to be at
all analogous. Then Mr. Smith refers me to Mr.
Elliott's quotation of Lady Ponsonby's case, who ac-
cupied apartments in Hampton Court Palace, and
where it sought to make her Ladyship, in virtue of
her occupation of those apartments, liable to be rated
to the relief of the poor ; but neither is that case ap-
plicable to the present. Hampton Court was at one
time a royal palace, but as my Lord Chief Justice
Denman, in giving judgment on that very case,
States, it has ceased to be so for the purpose of a re-
sidence of the Sovereign. It is true that there the
Queen has a housekeeper, to take care of her Picture
Gallery, and of some other apartments ; but there
are, I suppose, nearly 200 persons who occupy
apartments there as private individuals, under war-
rants from the Lord Chamberlain, and who have to
provide at their own expense all the household furni-
ture and fixtures which they may require for their
occupation of those apartments, some of which have
exclusive outward entrances opening upon the public
high road and Barge-walk, and who unquestionably
are liable to be rated to the relief of the poor. But
what has that to do with this case, where the inquiry
is, not as to the liability to be rated, but simply, has
Toms the exclusive command over the outer door of
the house in which he lives? Lord Hale says, "As
to an inmate who goeth in at the same door as the
owner of the house, he is in the nature of a lodger,
and if his chamber be broken open it is a burglary,