The trial lasted for six days and the facts were gone into most) thoroughly by a jury drawn, Juries ave at Shanghai, from persons, most of whom are engaged in m cantile. pursuits. and" therefor peculiarly fitted to deal with com mercial transactions, The charges, and the siements necessary to con: stitute them in law which had to be proved to the satisfaction of the Jury before they could convict the accused, were carefully explained by! counsel both for the Crown and for! the defence, and lengthy speeches, with respect both to. the points of involved and to the facts, were mind on behalf of the Crown and the accused.
'A copy of the charges and of the relevant, exhibits were in the hand the jury and it must have been easy for experienced men to follow' the arguments of counsel. In auch, cixeumstanees the learned Trial Fudge contented himself with a com. paratively short summary in which left the facts wholly in the hands the Jury, though he made certain comments of a general character on the evidence adduced in the case. And it is to the absence of an exhaustive and detailed charge that} exception is in the main taken on behalf of the defence; for no question of any insufficiency of evidence support the case for the Crown has been raised. The complaint is that the facts which wore proved were so handled by the learned Judge that the case for the defence hhadl not been placed before the jury for their consideration and decision with sufficient clearness and detail.
T will now deal with all. the grounds of appeal sot out in the notice of March 12, 1928.
{a)=Thle ground fe based on foged, to the Tenvned Judge having drawn a distinction between the definition of a partner for the purpose of civil and criminal proceedings. "It is also alleged on behalf of the accused that a certain agreement between Watanmal Boolehand and tone Parsram, who was in that firm's employment,' was wrongly admitted in evidence.
"The Partnership Question The accused strongly insisted during the whole of the trial that he was a partner in the firm ¢¢ Watarmal Boolchend, and that therefore he could not be convicted of the acts of fraudulent conversion or of making false entries alleged against him; and the question of what constituted partnership was fully dealt with by counsel on both sides. The Jearned Judge on page 3 of his summing up certainly said that most of the definitions mentioned to the fury were. "really definitions of a partner for civil proceedings, but they have a bearing on this matter to a certain extent with regard to a partner". But he went on to say, in substance, that he preferred to deal with the case from the point of view of whether defendant was the clerk or servant of Watanmal Boolchand; and he practically directed the jury that in order to find the! defendant guilty on the charges brought against him they must be. satisfied that defendant was the clerk or servant of Watanmal Bool-chand. It seems to me that the defence of partnership was clearly, placed before the jury, that the words I have quoted of' the Trial Judge do not bear the construction sought to be placed upon them, and that the direction actually given to the Jury was perhaps more favourable to the accused than the actual state of the Inw justified.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.