The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1892-01-16
Illegal Police Inauisitions.

"SA O
beneficial.
Illegal Police Inquisitions.
II is q fundamental maxim of the
Common Law that no person can be,
compelled to testify against himself.
1t is an inferential conclusion that no
person can be badgered or trapped or
bulldozed into te~stifying to his OWE
injury. In England, the home of the
Common Law, when a man is arrested
on a charge of crime, every official,
from the officer who arrests up to the
magistrate who commits him, is COM
PEELED to caution him that anything
he says may be used against him on
his trial. A failure to give such
a caution would result in the
instant discharge of the prisoner when
he came before a trial court. Any in
quisitorial attempt to extract from
him material for his own conviction
would not only cause his discharge;
it would be followed by the severe
punishment of the person who made
the attempt, were he policeman or
prosecutor, or even the Attorney
General.
This is the spirit of our law too. A
man is innocent until he is proven
guilty, and must be so treated; he
cannot be forced to aid in convicting
himself. He cannot be examined by
a Grand Jury with a view to his own
indictment. He cannot be made to
give direct testimony on his W
trial, and if he refuses to do so, the
prosecutor cannot plead that refusal
as an evidence of conscious guilt.
More than one trial has been upset
on account of Prosecutors error in
doing so. In short, the law surrounds
an accused person with every possible
protection, even against himself.
If this is the theory of the law, how
can the proceedings in the Durham
murder case in Essex county be rec
onciled with it. A man named Full
Ter. fell under the suspicion of the
police. What did they do9 They ar
rested him, took him to the Office of
Prosecutor Crane, and there sub
jected him to an inouisitorial
examination, the notes of which, we
are told, make from sixty to eighty
pages of typewriter matter. 1t
seems to us this is a gross and a
dalous violation of personal rights
and liberty. The man was not even
represented by counsel. lie had no.
body to prevent illegal or improper
questions from being asked him. He
was placed at the mercy of an astute
lawyer and bali a dozen spry detec-
tives all trying to trap him into a con-
tradictlon or ungarded adm ission.
1t is all wrong, and it is time the
judges put Il stop to it. 1t is the duty
of the police to make out q prima facie
case against q prisoner, if they can.
and take him promptly before a
magistrate. 1t is his right to hold
his tongue, and nobody has any right
to draw injurious conclusions from
his doing so, at least from a legal
point of view. 1t is, of course, the
prisoners privilege to make a volun-
tary statement if he wishes, and it is
the duty of the police, in that case,
to verify or disprove his allegations,
as the case may be; but the pretence
that u crosS-examination filling eighty
pages of type written manuscript
is q voluntary statement is simply
ridiculous. 1t is a Star Chamber in
QUESTION with the conviction, not the
acquittal of the man for its objective
point; and the element of compulsion
is not even thirly veiied.
The fact is, a law is beginning to
be interpreted of late in this and New
York States, it must be said that
whatever our high regard for political
liberty may be, personal rights and
personal freedom are far more jealousy
guarded in Great Britain than here.
THE libellous assaults made for the
last two days by the Ecening Journal
upon Mr.. Augustine f. Costello, the
author Of the Police History. appear
to be prompted by some one in the
Police Department. Mr.. Costello, we