Denton and Haughton Examiner, etc. — 1879-08-16 (Denton, Greater Manchester, England)

THE JURY AHD THE DERBY MURDER. SURPRISING STATEMENT BY MR. CROSS. The announcement which the Home Secretary had to make in the Rouse of Commons with respect to the , case of Gerald Mainwaring, lately condemned to d lath for the murder of a policeman at Derby, will be received, says the Standard, with mingled astonishment and disgust. The world hears from time to time of strange findings on the part of intelligent jurymen, and the satire of bygone days has left on record the statement that wretches used to hang that jurymen might dine; but there is, -we are - glad to believe, no parallel or precedent for the deliberate confession of the foreman of a jury that he and his colleagues, being unable to decide upon the question of life and death committed to them, had recourse to the ballot to determine which among them should have two votes—there being six' on one tide and six on the other. In what way the balloting was managed we are not told, but the foreman appears ,to be quite satisfied at being able to assure the world that the matter was not made to depend upon the actual tossing of a coin or muting of lots. Mr. gross is bound to say that such minute distinctions are too fine for him. "If," says he, " thzre were six on one side and six on the other, and they then agreed to ballot for the person who was to have the casting vote, that seems to me very like tossing for a verdict." The actual position in which each of those jurymen put himself may be illustrated by placing two pistols on a table, one loaded with bullet and the other with blank cartridge, and then " balloting" which you shall take up and discharge at a given person. No privilege of a jury can cover such playing fast and loose with death. The juryman who findsa verdict of wilful murder otherwise than in obedience to the oath which be has taken, is a murderer just as much as a hangman would be who should hang a man not condemned to death. From this crime the jury are in this ease saved by the timely disclosure which the foreman has made of their disgraceful conduct; for, of course, upon the result of a verdict en found the Home Secretary declines to act. In spite, of their efforts the blood of the wretched Mainwaring will not be upon their heads. What course will now be taken has not been announced. If the jury are so discredited that their whole proceedings are null, it would follow that there has been no finding. But if the verdict, however tainted, technically stands good, there remains nothing but to commute the sentence. It is much to be regretted that the case should have to be dealt with upon any other consideration than that of its strict merits. It raised a question which ism:stoutly arising, and towards the solution of which any contribution is welcome. The verdict of the jury, had it been honestly found, would have been such a contribution. As matters now stand, people will begin to ask whether such short and capricious methods of deciding momentous questions are common with juries, or whether we must consider the twelve men who composed this particular jury to be once rtional specimens. The latter is not a supposition easy to maintain, but the alternative 'view is most disquiet. ing. It is almost impossible to over-estimate the severity of the blow which a few revelations of this kind deal at the whole system of trial by jury.