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THE LAW AS TO CONSTRUCTIVE MURDER.
1307
THE LAW AS TO CONSTRUCTIVE MURDER.
Registrar of the General Medical Council that jury trying the case might append to their verdict a special the registered as EDWARD JOSEPH NUGENT was finding to the effect that the accused, when he committed the act which led to the death of the deceased, had an impersonator but that nothing was done to revoke the reasonable ground for believing, and did, in fact, believe, that registration or prevent further deception of the public until death would not result from such act, and that he used all a frightful calamity had its outcome in penal servitude reasonable skill, and all other means in his power to prevent for the criminal. Severe things were then said as to the its so resulting." The judge upon such special finding supervision of the Council, but the critics were, to would be empowered to record the sentence of death instead our thinking, not quite mindful of the difficulties of the of passing it in open court and to mitigate during the to the
man
assizes such sentence of death to a term of penal servitude in his own discretion. It must be said in favour of the. second section of the Act suggested by Mr. Pitt-Lewis that it appears to aim at interpreting the wishes of most Act would enable the Council to remove his name. But we of us better than the Bill introduced into Parliament by will admit that we are a little surprised to find the follow- Mr. Ambrose, Q.C., and Sir Andrew Scoble. This, it will ing entry in the new Medical Register, published only a be remembered, would meet the difficulty by enacting that upon a trial for murder no constructive or implied malice fortnight ago :shall be imputed to the accused merely because it is shown Name, Edward Joseph Nugent; address, 38, Barking- that he caused the death of the deceased by or in the course road, Canning Town, London, E.; date and place of regisof the commission of or attempt to commit some other tration, 1868, Sept. 15th, Ireland; qualifications, Lie. R. felony"; and it has been suggested that if this were the Coll. Surg. Irel., 1866, Lic. K. Q. Coll. Phys. Irel., 1872. law the man who with robbery as his object wrecked a It is known, and has been known for several months, that train causing many deaths in so doing and the man who the man who practised in the neighbourhood of Canning shooting at a man to murder him missed him but killed Town, and whose present address is one of Her Majesty’s a stranger behind him would alike escape hanging, a. prisons, was not NUGENT but ROWLAND, and also that consummation which few would desire. On the other band, NUGENT’S address is somewhere in Australia. Taking these the special finding suggested by Mr. Pitt-Lewis would be an difficult one to base on any evidence which could considerations with the sworn allegation that the real exceedingly conceivably be given, except perhaps by the prisoner, who is NUGENT on the eve of his departure from England handed now a competent witness, while it seems to have been over his diplomas to his impersonator in consideration of designed chiefly to meet cases of death through illegal opera3s. 6d. a week to be allowed to the wife whom he was tions rather than to deal with the question generally. It deserting, we think a strong case is made out for the was no doubt suggested by the interpretation of the existing temporary exclusion of the entry from the Register pending law laid down by the Attorney-General in the Collins case, to which most other lawyers have not assented, thatif the any further proceedings deemed necessary, and we should act done was not such as of necessity to cause danger if not like to hear the official reason for having acted otherwise. unskilfully performed it was open to the jury to return a verdict of manslaughter." This is not in accordance with the opinion of Mr. Justice Bigham, as Mr. Pitt Lewis seems in one place to suggest, for that learned judge in trying Whitmarsh said that his act could only be manslaughter "if he could not as a reasonable man have con"Ne quid nimis." templated that it would result in death," a very different thing. Mr. Pitt-Lewis, however, is a learned rather than a. luminous writer, and his article, though interesting and sugTHE LAW AS TO CONSTRUCTIVE MURDER. is by no means easy to follow or to agree with in i gestive, MR. PITT-LEWIS, Q.C., has contributed to the Nineteenth i some of its passages. Century for May an article under the above heading in which he reviews the difficulties and discrepancies which THE ELECTED AMERICAN FELLOW OF THE have recently arisen in cases where death has followed ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEONS OF illegal operations for the procurement of abortion and ends ENGLAND. by indicating the nature of the measure which in his view That the discrewould best put a stop to them. THE admission by election of an American surgeon to the pancies exist no one will deny and the fact that the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England at law as it stands does not commend itself to juries any time would be an interesting event. It is especially so owing to its severity is not an unprecedented circumstance. at the present period when in the evolution of history a The same state of affairs arose when the capital sentence new recognition is being given everywhere to the essential was pronounced for comparatively trifling crimes : the jury alliance between England and the United States. In no acquitted guilty prisoners, or where they convicted commuta- sphere is this more important or more seemly than tion followed as a matter of course until an Act of Parlia- in the serene atmosphere of science, and in no. ment more in accordance with the spirit of the age was branch of science more than in that of medicine. The passed. The Act now needed, according to the view of professors of this branch on both sides of the Atlantic Mr. Pitt-Lewis, should first "declare the law to be as it was have long vied with each other in every demonstration of laid down by Sir L. Foster, by the late Mr. Justice Black- friendship and hospitality. We offer our congratulations burn, and by the late Chief Justice Cockburn and Baron to Frederic Shepard Dennis, M.D., Professor of the Bramwell, and as the great majority of lawyers still believe Principles and Practice of Surgery in the Bellevue Hospital it to be" ; that is, presumably, that if a man in com- Medical College, &c., to whom the unprecedented honour, as mitting or attempting to commit a felony kills another an American Member of the College of 20 years’ standing, of he is guilty of murder. A second section, he con- election to the Fellowship has fallen. The election is not one and enact that "in more honourable to Professor Dennis than it is creditable to this should follow tinues, cases coming within the first section of the Act the the College. Few men combine the qualities and the merits
Registrar’s work. A man named EDWARD JOSEPH NUGENT had a right to a place on the Register until he died or did something which under the proper provisions of the Medical
,
Annotations.
,
-_
_
THE LAW AS TO CONSTRUCTIVE MURDER.
Registrar of the General Medical Council that jury trying the case might append to their verdict a special the registered as EDWARD JOSEPH NUGENT was finding to the effect that the accused, when he committed the act which led to the death of the deceased, had an impersonator but that nothing was done to revoke the reasonable ground for believing, and did, in fact, believe, that registration or prevent further deception of the public until death would not result from such act, and that he used all a frightful calamity had its outcome in penal servitude reasonable skill, and all other means in his power to prevent for the criminal. Severe things were then said as to the its so resulting." The judge upon such special finding supervision of the Council, but the critics were, to would be empowered to record the sentence of death instead our thinking, not quite mindful of the difficulties of the of passing it in open court and to mitigate during the to the
man
assizes such sentence of death to a term of penal servitude in his own discretion. It must be said in favour of the. second section of the Act suggested by Mr. Pitt-Lewis that it appears to aim at interpreting the wishes of most Act would enable the Council to remove his name. But we of us better than the Bill introduced into Parliament by will admit that we are a little surprised to find the follow- Mr. Ambrose, Q.C., and Sir Andrew Scoble. This, it will ing entry in the new Medical Register, published only a be remembered, would meet the difficulty by enacting that upon a trial for murder no constructive or implied malice fortnight ago :shall be imputed to the accused merely because it is shown Name, Edward Joseph Nugent; address, 38, Barking- that he caused the death of the deceased by or in the course road, Canning Town, London, E.; date and place of regisof the commission of or attempt to commit some other tration, 1868, Sept. 15th, Ireland; qualifications, Lie. R. felony"; and it has been suggested that if this were the Coll. Surg. Irel., 1866, Lic. K. Q. Coll. Phys. Irel., 1872. law the man who with robbery as his object wrecked a It is known, and has been known for several months, that train causing many deaths in so doing and the man who the man who practised in the neighbourhood of Canning shooting at a man to murder him missed him but killed Town, and whose present address is one of Her Majesty’s a stranger behind him would alike escape hanging, a. prisons, was not NUGENT but ROWLAND, and also that consummation which few would desire. On the other band, NUGENT’S address is somewhere in Australia. Taking these the special finding suggested by Mr. Pitt-Lewis would be an difficult one to base on any evidence which could considerations with the sworn allegation that the real exceedingly conceivably be given, except perhaps by the prisoner, who is NUGENT on the eve of his departure from England handed now a competent witness, while it seems to have been over his diplomas to his impersonator in consideration of designed chiefly to meet cases of death through illegal opera3s. 6d. a week to be allowed to the wife whom he was tions rather than to deal with the question generally. It deserting, we think a strong case is made out for the was no doubt suggested by the interpretation of the existing temporary exclusion of the entry from the Register pending law laid down by the Attorney-General in the Collins case, to which most other lawyers have not assented, thatif the any further proceedings deemed necessary, and we should act done was not such as of necessity to cause danger if not like to hear the official reason for having acted otherwise. unskilfully performed it was open to the jury to return a verdict of manslaughter." This is not in accordance with the opinion of Mr. Justice Bigham, as Mr. Pitt Lewis seems in one place to suggest, for that learned judge in trying Whitmarsh said that his act could only be manslaughter "if he could not as a reasonable man have con"Ne quid nimis." templated that it would result in death," a very different thing. Mr. Pitt-Lewis, however, is a learned rather than a. luminous writer, and his article, though interesting and sugTHE LAW AS TO CONSTRUCTIVE MURDER. is by no means easy to follow or to agree with in i gestive, MR. PITT-LEWIS, Q.C., has contributed to the Nineteenth i some of its passages. Century for May an article under the above heading in which he reviews the difficulties and discrepancies which THE ELECTED AMERICAN FELLOW OF THE have recently arisen in cases where death has followed ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEONS OF illegal operations for the procurement of abortion and ends ENGLAND. by indicating the nature of the measure which in his view That the discrewould best put a stop to them. THE admission by election of an American surgeon to the pancies exist no one will deny and the fact that the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England at law as it stands does not commend itself to juries any time would be an interesting event. It is especially so owing to its severity is not an unprecedented circumstance. at the present period when in the evolution of history a The same state of affairs arose when the capital sentence new recognition is being given everywhere to the essential was pronounced for comparatively trifling crimes : the jury alliance between England and the United States. In no acquitted guilty prisoners, or where they convicted commuta- sphere is this more important or more seemly than tion followed as a matter of course until an Act of Parlia- in the serene atmosphere of science, and in no. ment more in accordance with the spirit of the age was branch of science more than in that of medicine. The passed. The Act now needed, according to the view of professors of this branch on both sides of the Atlantic Mr. Pitt-Lewis, should first "declare the law to be as it was have long vied with each other in every demonstration of laid down by Sir L. Foster, by the late Mr. Justice Black- friendship and hospitality. We offer our congratulations burn, and by the late Chief Justice Cockburn and Baron to Frederic Shepard Dennis, M.D., Professor of the Bramwell, and as the great majority of lawyers still believe Principles and Practice of Surgery in the Bellevue Hospital it to be" ; that is, presumably, that if a man in com- Medical College, &c., to whom the unprecedented honour, as mitting or attempting to commit a felony kills another an American Member of the College of 20 years’ standing, of he is guilty of murder. A second section, he con- election to the Fellowship has fallen. The election is not one and enact that "in more honourable to Professor Dennis than it is creditable to this should follow tinues, cases coming within the first section of the Act the the College. Few men combine the qualities and the merits
Registrar’s work. A man named EDWARD JOSEPH NUGENT had a right to a place on the Register until he died or did something which under the proper provisions of the Medical
,
Annotations.
,
-_
_