Arizona weekly citizen., 1894-12-22
AN AMENDMENT WANTED.

l for the trials resulting therefrom Will
 aggregate between S3OOO and s4OOO. The
 history about this little piece of litiga-
 tion is as follows:
 Two or more years ago man by the
 name of John Parks, living near Crit
 tendep, was arrested for killing COW
 owned by Colin Cameron; he was like
 wise charged with having killed a calf
 belonging to w. H. Barnett. On the
 COW trials Parks was finally acquitted,
 but, strange as it may appear, one of
 his witnesses, man named Howard,
 was convicted of perjury and sentenced
 to the penitentiary. The apparent in- | justice of convicting a witness for per jury and exonerating the principal upon the evidence given, was so manifest that Governor Hughes exercised his execu-
 tive right and granted the man par don. Clearly both were guilty or both
 were innocent, but that is not pertinent
 to the present issue.
 Parks was twice tried under the in- dictment of calf killing. At the first
 trial the jury disagreed and the St cond
 trial resulted in an acquittal, but guilty
 or not guilty, conviction or no cOnvic-
 tion, the enc glaring fact remains that
 the law is notoriously wrong.
 The discriminating laws upon our statute books make such things possible. Under said statutes the cattle inter- ests are protected to a foolish excess over other classes of property. Now, this is not a cattlem8n's country any more than it IS that of a merchant,
 miner, or any other class or occupation, and the law making an Individuous dis crimination should be repealed.
 Any theft of property other than live stock of less value than S5O IS, per force, tried before the nearest justice of the peace and the oRse summararily dis posed of with but little cost to the county. The maximum punishment for such cases is a stipulated fine or inn prisonment in the county jail for pe- niod not exceeding six months. If, how ever, the theft is of live stock, no mat ter how worthless or trivial of value 1t may be, the case is without the pale of the justice court so far as the final dis position is concerned. The nearest jus tice is required to give the accused a prilIminary hearing, and if sufficient evidence IS produced to hold the culprit, he is bound over to await the action of the next grand jury, with results often disastrous not only to county finances but also to the ends of justice. The maximum punishment in such cases is ten years in the peniteutiary, and pros 1 pective loss of citizenship.
 The punishment and manner of pun ishment between the two classes of crimes is fearfulIy and wonderfully un- proportlonate.
 Between the time of commitment and l the meeting of the grand jury months frequently elapse and many of witnesses l who testified at the hearing are either | no longer attsinable or scattered far and wide. These must be gathered in by subpoenas personally served by officers of the law, and if indigeut the county | must be at the expense of bringing them to court, as we'll as maintaining them while here, in addition to the fee allow ed, and it is notorious fact, to put it ID its mildest form, that many of these witnesses are gifted with the poorest of memories and forget much of their tes- timony given at the time of the hearing. | The result is tat the grand jury, after a world of expense has been incurred, is compelled to throw more than half the | cases out for lack of sufficient evidence to find an indictment. And frequently l when they do reach the court the ac- cused are acquitted by the !uries not be- cause of question of guilt, but rather | from the sense of justice which sDI- mates the average American iuryman | the punishment of having lain in jail l from the time of commitment to the l time of trial, being deemed amply sufi- ! cient for the crime.
 If the criminal cases growing out of | theft of live stock, of less value than | fifty dollars, can be disposed of by the justice before whom the preliminary | hearing is had, the ends ot justice will | not only be better served but the ex- pense to the county-and by the county | we mean the people-in the disposition | of such cases would be reduced at least | ten fold. Cattle interests would, on the | whole, be better protected; more con- victions would be had for the reason l that the evidence under which the | arrest is made is present and the county | would be about ten thousand dollars | better off each year.
 But aside from this there is no Amer ican justice in the law which makes | fish of one class of property and flesh | of another. A party may be tried | before the nearest justice for stealing | merchandise to the value of S4999 and if | convicted sentenced to six months in | the county jal, but if the same party l misappropriates a mangy two bit hog the crime must be dignified by preli- minary hearing before justice and by him be bound to await the action of the | next grand jury; must be tried by the district court, and if convicted can be can be sentenced to ten years in the penitentiary. Out upon such law. It is.a disgrace to onr statute books and burden to our people.
 The cattlemen of Pima county pay about one fifth the taxes, but taxes or no taxes, it must not be understood that We are | net in favor of protecting their very |