Sept 23. our issue of last Frids correspondent signing himself " Fiat Sostitin"" raised certain serious charges against the conduct of the recent murder trials at Weihaiwei. Those charges were, that there was no trial by jury; that the accused were not provided with a legal defender; and that an intolerable delay was permitted to take place between the crime and trial It may be permissible to our correspondent was particularly anxious that his letter should not be read #8 a personal attack upon any of the officials concerned. At the same time, there wadid appear to have been a certain amount of feeling among foreign residents in the Territory on the subject of the trial and for that reason " Fiat!
remarks may be welcome ed as providing an opportunity for removing any misapprehensions, the more so that the letter itself is based on an entire misunderstanding of the procedure as laid down. The first jurisdiction in Weihaiwei was given by Order in Council, 1901, and afterwards by Ordinance. Art-ide 20 of the Order in Council provides that (1) When a native case, criminal or civil, thinks fit, may try the case with two assessors.
(2) An assessor shall be s native, having a competent knowledge of Chinese law and custom, nominated and summoned or requested by the Court to! act as assessor,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.