The Sun.
London, England, 1833-06-13 00:00:00

iii.- -I

e Hilda could pout* have id aside dist noble vadlot„ but it
.vou Id have been as firmly settled in the records of the country
as it was in the heart of the people.
Sir GEORGE GREY said that It was incumbent upon him
to refute the assumptions of the Hon. and Learned Member,
for if they were to go forth with the ' weight which his
talents commanded, they were calculated to do much
harm.—(Hear, hear, hear.) He had perverted the case, not
intentionally, but he had assumed and stated as facts things
which had no foundation. No man, whether lawyer or
not, could doubt but that the killing of a policeman
in the discharge of his duty was murder. In this
case the facts were, not that Cully had pressed an individual
threatening to take his life, and that he was killed while so
pressing that individual as to endanger his life. There had not
been a single individual brought forward upon the inquest who
had received wounds which would at all endanger life, so that
that argument altogether fell from under the Hon. and Learned
Gentleman. Had the verdict not been quashed an impression
would have gone abroad, which would have been dangerous,
that a man had a right to resist the constituted authorities
even unto the death.

Mr. GODSON regretted that his Majesty's Government
through their law-officers had thought it necessary to quash
the inquisition; it would have been much wiser if
the verdict had been permitted to remain attached to
it, because it was the inquisition only which had been
attacked and not the verdict ; the latter was the act of
the Coroner alone. The jury had found the verdict of " Justi-
fiable Homicide;" that the police, of which Robert Cully was
one, had made an unprovoked attack—he would not use the
other words of the verdict, because he wished to discuss the
subject calmly, temperately, and dispasilonately—that the police
had made an unprovoked attack on the multitude, and that
one of that multitude had caused in a justifiable manner his
death. Who was there in England would say that seventeen
men on their oaths had found a verdict which was contrary to
the fact, and that they had thereby violated their oaths ?
Sir G. GREY said he did not impute to them a violation of
their oaths, but that they were wrong in point of law.
Mr. GODSON again deplored that Government had ever
raised the question, but as a lawyer, he was justified in saying
that there was no legal power to quash the verdict. They
found that the blow that had been given was justifiable—that
was found as a fact, and no gentleman required to be told that
all the facts of the case should not be stated in the verdict. If
an action was brought, the verdict was either for the plaintiff or
defendant; so in a case of murder the verdict was either guilty or
not guilty. The whole conduct of Government only went to
impugn the inquisition and not the verdict, which was drawn up
by the coroner, who knew what he had to draw out, and might
have drawn a good inquisition; he might have averred
that a number of persons were collected together—that the
police made an unprovoked attack on them—that R. Cully was
one of those police—and that the blow was given by a
person so attacked, which was necessary to save his own
life.—(Hear.) In that form the inquisition would have
supported the verdict, the Court of King's Bench would never
have quashed the inquisition, and the trial by jury would not
have been questioned. The mistake, therefore; was with
the Coroner, who alone was censured, and not the Jury.—
(Hear, hear.) He trusted that the people would thus
know, that in what had taken place, no censure had
been cast on the Trial by. Jury. The verdict had not been
attacked, and Government had gone out of their way in
getting the inquisition quashed.—(Hear, hear.) The
Honourable and Learned Solicitor. General stated that one
reason for quashing it, was for fear it should ever be tendered
in evidence in any criminal case. He had looked for authori-
ties, and he could find no instance in which an inquisition had
ever been tendered in evidence. The only part of the proceed.
ings which could be evidence was the depositions of witnesses.
He again deplored the steps that had been taken by hit
Majesty's Government, which went to stultify their own acts.
Mr. HUME was sorry that the Solicitor-General was
not in the House to hear the convincing arguments
which had been adduced by the Learned Gentlemen
who had last spoken ; and deprecated the idea of the Solicitor_
General producing the Bill calling the meetings together,
as evidence against the parties who were assembled
without any proof to show from whence it came, and by which
it was issued. The Hon. Member regretted also the obloquy that
had been thrown upon the police by these transactions, and
ridiculed the idea of any importance being attached
t the meeting, and the attempt to magnify the pro.
ceedings into treason. The Learned Solicitor Ge-
neral, he said, had been left without a leg to
stand on, and had unfairly alluded to the opinions of
Hon. Members expressed whilst the inquest was holding, for-
getting the proclamation which had been issued by the Govern.
ment off,ring a reward of 2001. for the apprehension of the mur-
derer of Cully, whilst a verdict existed of justifiable homicide.
The Hon. Member concluded by saying, that the Government
appeared tube making every efort to bring its Members into dis-
repute with the people of England.
The House adjourned, without coming to any decision on the
petition, at three o'clock.

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