On coroners / a paper by E. M. Harwood.

  • Harwood, E.B.
Date:
[1885]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On coroners / a paper by E. M. Harwood. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    11/24 (page 7)
    and dh'ected by law to appoint deputies to act in tlieir stead in certain cases, and that the Coroners of Counties have no sufficient authority for making such appointments, it is enacted : That from and after the passing of this Act it shall be lawful for every Coroner of any county, city, riding, liberty, or division, and he is hereby directed by writing under his hand and seal to nominate and appoint from time to time a fit and proi)er person—such appointment being subject to the approval of the Lord High Chancellor, Lord Keeper or Lords Commissioners of the Great Seal—to act for him as his deputy in the holding of inquests, with a proviso that every such appointment may at any time be cancelled and revoked by the Coroner by whom the same was made. The Coroner also of any borough, to^vn, or city named in the Municipal Corporations Act, 5th and 6th William IV., cap. 76, is empowered by 6th and 7th William IV., cap. 105, sec. 6, in case of illness or unavoidable absence, to appoint by writing under his hand and seal a fit person, being a barrister-at-law or an attorney, and not being an Alderman or Councillor of such borough, to act for him as deputy during his illness or absence, but no longer; and the Mayor or two Justices are on each occasion to certify under their hands and seals the necessity for the appointment so made, stating the cause of absence, which certificate must be openly read to every inquest jury summoned by such deputy. The City of Bristol being a county of itself, this foi'm of appointment does not apply, and the deputy is appointed as before mentioned in counties, and it holds good until re- scinded ; and the appointment need not be read on each occasion. Previously to power being given to appoint a Deputy Coroner an inquisition taken by one was void, and in 1819 a case was decided hereon. A jury was sworn during the Coroner's absence by his clerk, upon view of the body of John Lees, killed during the Manchester Riots : the inquest was then adjourned and the body buried. On the Coroner afterwards attending in person the jury were re-sworn, but not super visum corporis, and the Coroner proceeded to examine witnesses for some days. Dui ing the examination the Coroner caused the body to be disinterred and viewed it, but not in the presence of the jury. It was held by all the Judges of the King's Bench that a Coroner's duty was judicial, and an inquest in which the jury were not sworn before the Coroner himself and super visum was absolutely void. The death of the Coroner cancels the deputy's powers. A peculiar difficulty herein recently arose at Portsmouth. The Coroner died on a Tuesday, and on Wednesday a man died of suffoca- tion at a chemical manufactory. No inquest could be held, as the Deputy Coroner had no power. If the jury are sworn and the proceedings begin before the deputy, he should finish them though the Coroner be present in the course of holding the inquest, and the inquisition is properly signed in the name of the principal—thus A B, Coroner, by C D, his deputy—and is properly described as having been taken before the principal Coroner. The duties of Coroners are now practically confined to enquiries into the causes of suspicious deaths, deaths occasioned by accident or injury occur- ring within a year and a day previously, sudden deaths, infanticide, murders and manslaughters, suicides, deaths from poison, and deaths occurring in prisons.