"A Merciful Sentence"
Aser Khan, lascar ship's fireman, was sentenced by Judge P. Grant Jones at HM. Supreme Court yesterday to five years' imprisonment with hard labour for the manslaughter of Andrew Stephen Ford, 55-year-old Welsh member of the crew of the s. Salvus, Cardiff collier, at Shanghai on August 13. After the Judge's summing-up, the jury retired, and on their return announced that accused had been found not guilty on the charge of murder, which he had faced throughout the hearing, but that he was guilty of manslaughter.
As the jury filed in, Aser Khan rose and listened with rapt attention, betraying no sign of emotion as they were asked if they had agreed upon a verdict. "We find that the prisoner is not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter" stated that foreman, following which Mr. K. E. Newman, representing Aser Khan, submitted to the Judge that the attack had been entirely unpremeditated. When asked it he had anything to say before judgment was passed prisoner redid not do anything.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.