DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.70300#0223
CASE OF OBSTINACY.
>95
suffered sentence of death to be passed on him, without
pleading to his indictment.
This man was arraigned in the preceding Assizes, and put-
ting on the appearance of insanity, was then declared by a
Jury—Mute by the visitation of God. His brother, who
was tried at the same time, and for the same crime, was found
guilty, and executed.
“ Michael M‘Donnell, aged 27, a labourer, from Glasgow,
was indicted for having, on the 11 th of June, 1816, broken
into the parish church of Church Lawton, and stolen there-
out a silver flaggon, a silver cup, and a silver salver, the pro-
perty of the churchwardens of Church Lawton. On the
prisoner being put to the bar, he was seized with a real or 1
affected fit of trembling, and an apparently convulsive motion
of the muscles of the face. The indictment was then read,
but he appeared not to notice it in the slightest way.
C( The Chief Justice then addressed him to the following’
. effect‘ Prisoner at the bar, you are charged with a capital
offence, and are called upon to plead guilty or not guilty to
an indictment for sacrilege. I do hope that you are aware
of the situation in which you stand; for if a Jury be em-
pannelled, and on the evidence adduced before them, they
give in a verdict that you are mute through fraud and obsti-
nacy, and not by the visitation of God, the only course which
the Court will have to adopt, will be immediately to pass
upon you the sentence of death? Mr. Humphreys, the
prothonotary, then read the indictment, and he was called
upon to plead. After some little time had elapsed, in
the course of which, the trepidation in his left arm had
evidently ceased, he was again asked the usual question-
1 Guilty or not guilty i” when he said, with great rapidity of
utterance, ‘ Yes, yes.’
(( The Chief Justice told him such a pleading could not
be taken, as the Court could not say whether he meant to
acknowledge his guilt, or put himself upon his trial by his
o 2
>95
suffered sentence of death to be passed on him, without
pleading to his indictment.
This man was arraigned in the preceding Assizes, and put-
ting on the appearance of insanity, was then declared by a
Jury—Mute by the visitation of God. His brother, who
was tried at the same time, and for the same crime, was found
guilty, and executed.
“ Michael M‘Donnell, aged 27, a labourer, from Glasgow,
was indicted for having, on the 11 th of June, 1816, broken
into the parish church of Church Lawton, and stolen there-
out a silver flaggon, a silver cup, and a silver salver, the pro-
perty of the churchwardens of Church Lawton. On the
prisoner being put to the bar, he was seized with a real or 1
affected fit of trembling, and an apparently convulsive motion
of the muscles of the face. The indictment was then read,
but he appeared not to notice it in the slightest way.
C( The Chief Justice then addressed him to the following’
. effect‘ Prisoner at the bar, you are charged with a capital
offence, and are called upon to plead guilty or not guilty to
an indictment for sacrilege. I do hope that you are aware
of the situation in which you stand; for if a Jury be em-
pannelled, and on the evidence adduced before them, they
give in a verdict that you are mute through fraud and obsti-
nacy, and not by the visitation of God, the only course which
the Court will have to adopt, will be immediately to pass
upon you the sentence of death? Mr. Humphreys, the
prothonotary, then read the indictment, and he was called
upon to plead. After some little time had elapsed, in
the course of which, the trepidation in his left arm had
evidently ceased, he was again asked the usual question-
1 Guilty or not guilty i” when he said, with great rapidity of
utterance, ‘ Yes, yes.’
(( The Chief Justice told him such a pleading could not
be taken, as the Court could not say whether he meant to
acknowledge his guilt, or put himself upon his trial by his
o 2