The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-04-12 00:00:00

LIVERPOOL TOWN COUNCIL.

The monthly and special meeting of the Council was
held on Wednesday, the Mayor presiding.

INTERFERENCE WITH THE POLICE

Mr. Alderman PARKER said that, before proceeding to
business, he was desirous of defending himself from an
attack which had been made upon him, in a report of a
Sub-committee of Magistrates on the subject of granting
licenses to marine-store dealers, and a copy of which had
been sent by the bench of magistrates to the Finance
Committee. The magistrates had thought proper to
bring a charge against him of interfering with the police
force in the discharge of their duties. The scene was in
1842. The zeal and devotedness of the magistracy of the
borough had induced them to go back to the year 1842 to
found a charge against him of interfering with the police
in the discharge of their duties. Then he must say a word
upon the manner in which the magistrates had thought
proper to bring this matter forward. A charge was brought
against two junior members of the Council of interfering
with the detective police. The magistrates got hold of it,
and opened their doors to reporters to hear the charge, and
all the members of the Council knew it had ended in no-
thing. But when a charge was brought forward against
other members of the Council—himself for one—what did
the magistrates do ? Would it have been any condescen-
sion on the part of the magistrates to him, an alderman of
this borough, to have written him a note to appear and
vindicate his character ? No ; but upon the evidence of
a man whom he would bring before the Council by and
by, they appointed a select committee of three or four;
the inquiry proceeded with closed doors, and a report was
drawn up, containing a charge implicating him and others.
The whole of the proceedings of the Watch Committee
were or used to be regularly recorded. As a policeman,
this man Kehoe must have known his duties in those days.
The practice was to record everything in the police-books
against an individual. No record of it was found ; but by
a great stretch of his memory he founded his charge.
Now he (Mr. Parker) must say a word upon the character
of Kehoe. Kehoe was a man of whose character the
Council would hear more by and by. He was a man who,
at the commencement of the magistrates' report, was
called " a man of unblemished character;" and when a
man told him (Mr. Parker) over and over again how
honest he was, he always suspected something ; but not
satisfied with what they said at the commencement of the
report, they brought Kehoe's character forward again at
the end. "Heis a man whose veracity entitles him to
the confidence of the magistrates." This was reiterated
at the bottom. One might suppose that they did not do
this without having some evidence of it; but they did not
mice a single inquiry. He would not accuse them of
wilful neglect of duty, but it was a gross neglect in not
doing it. No man entertained more respect for the magis-
trates than he did ; but when a man sank from the dig-
nity of office, then he thought that the magisterial robes
were no protection to him. This Kehoe, it was said, was
" a man of unblemished character." This was in 1842.
In 1839, the Watch Committee of that day reduced Kehoe
for gross falsehoods. In December, 1839—that was a
short period before this man of veracity professed to found
this charge against him—in 1839 he was accused of gross
falsehoods before the committee, in having endeavoured
to irjure the character of another man, and the punish-
ment inflicted upon him was one of the heaviest that
could be given by the Watch Committee of that day ; he
was reduced from an acting bridewell-keeper at 28s. to an
acting constable at 16s. per week. He was put in the lowest
situation that he could be, not to be discharged from the force.
Mr. William Earle was on the committee at the time
when this man Kehoe was visited with severe punishment
—(hear, hear)—and the same Mr. William Earle, who
had nothing like so retentive a memory as Mr. Kehoe,
seemed to have forgot this circumstance. But when the
general question came on for discussion, gentlemen would
be prepared with other evidence, but not quite so strong.
Kehoe recollected that in 1842 Mr. Parker interfered with
him in the discharge of his duty, and he stated before the
magistrates that this interference had kept him in terro-
rem in the discharge of his duty from 1842 to 1853. But
he would bring Kehoe to 1853, A fortnight ago, when be
was an applicant for a situation, this same Kehoe, of
unblemished character, in whom the magistrates had
unbounded confidence, was a candidate for an office
under the Watch Cuunnittce. The Watch Committee
inquired into his character. Why, when his character
was read to the committee, there was not one member of
the committee of the present day who could say one word
for Kehoe, but the surprise was how a man of such disre-
putable character could have been so long kept in the
police force. (Hear, hear.) This was the man upon
whose evidence he (Mr. Parker) had been branded before
the public for the last fortnight as a man who had been
interfering with the police force in the discharge of their
duty. And Kehoe petitioned the bench of magistrates
that he might be released from the arduous and onorous
duty of reporting on the applications for marine-store
dealers' licences. Now, at the very time he asked to be
released from that duty, this Kahoe was applying to Mr.
Tyson, in the Town-clerk's office, for some remuneration
for doing it. The Council should have Mr. Tyson's re-
port :it was not what he (Mr. Parker) said—it was from
facts alone that he argued. He must say a word or two
about the man named Thomas Wagden. He found till-
man out after a good deal of trouble. He now kept a.,
ironmonger's shop in Scotland-road. He was a man who
paid 20s. in the pound, a burgess of this town ; and he
was a man of unimpeachable character, and had a right to
protection if he needed it. His father was connected with
paper-manufacturing. For fifteen years he was in the
rag line. He never had a charge brought against him,
and as an individual he was as respectable as any man on
the bench of magistrates.. So much for Wagden, and so
much for Kehoe. The first person in this drama was his
(Mr. Parker's) humble self. He thought, from his posi-
tion as an alderman of this borough, and the compliment
which the Council had paid him by electing him an alder-
man, be was not called upon to say anything regarding
himself. That circumstance, in order that he might not
be accused of egotism, would make him refrain from say-
ing one word.
Mr.
'no oaDn ay ee,
improper w ho hadma
nbneee
r interferedsimilarlyn
interference by Inspector Kehoe,
emphaticallywith denied
having the in.
spector. He had upon one occasion gone
license. If such inquiries were not to be allowed, muni.
cipal make
authority
b u
mcharged witha
farce. (Hear, hr
The magistrates appeared to inferthat hers of the
Council were,
by this interference, going a begging for
votes. The gentlemen who drew up the report might
have
mseeguiialttye of such conduct; but he trusted
that it we on u d d by every member of the Town
Council.
became
inquiry intoe a
it theog ert ehaear so n n
members
the e m refusal
e o
hear.)
o Mr. Dowling
to
Mr. TOULMIN thought it his duty to rise and answer
the imputation which had been cast upon his character.
It was impossible he could have used the language im-
puted to him by Inspector Kehoe, and he begged to give
a most unqualified contradiction to every part of Kehoe's