Tuesday 11th Feb 2025 - Graham Higgins - Tales from the Bench

 

Tuesday 11th February - Graham Higgins - Tales from the Bench

Life as a Local Magistrate in our historic English legal system

On a cold, damp February evening 40 people filled the hall to hear Graham’s Tales from the Bench. He started with a brief description of a Magistrate or J.P. They are volunteers who represent us, the public and sit in benches of two or three in a court building as a Bench, with a Legal advisor. There are three Jurisdictions: Criminal over 18, Youth Crime, and Family Courts. Cases are all indictable by a decision to Bail or Remand, Guilty or Innocent, Discharge, Fine, Community Order, Custody (up to a year in Prison). All cases start in Magistrates court, and 95% are concluded there. Sentences must be based on Sentencing Guidelines, which give a consistent national approach to sentencing, with a code that the courts must follow.

Graham then read two statements,

1) ‘Shoplifting, burglary and robberies are generally committed by impoverished drunkards, whose greatest encouragement is the little obstruction they find in the disposition of their plunder’.

2) ‘Shoplifting and robberies (e.g: theft of mobile phones) are generally committed by impoverished drug addicts, whose greatest encouragement is the little obstruction they find in selling their stolen goods’

The first is a 1751 quote from Henry Fielding (author of Tom Jones) and a famous Bow Street Magistrate. The second is Graham’s take, 274 years later, from his recent court sitting with two repeat offenders shoplifting £700 worth each. £700 today would have been worth 50 shillings in 1751. A theft of 5 shillings had been a capital “hanging offence ”since 1699!

The most Common Crimes that come before Magistrates in 2025 involve: use of Knives to injure or threaten; Domestic Violence (often with mobile phone as a weapon!) coercion; sharing indecent images; Motoring; Shoplifting; Possessing or supplying drugs; and Fraud.

Historically, it was Alfred the Great who first made crime and crime prevention a responsibility of the Community, through the “Hue and Cry”, where anyone wronged could call upon and compel everyone else in a community to chase a criminal. For more serious crimes, the “Posse Comitatus” could be raised by the king's county official, the sheriff, to track down a criminal. (The origin of the Posse seen in many US Westerns!)

If you were found guilty of a crime you would expect to face a severe punishment. Thieves had their hands cut off. Women who committed murder were strangled and then burnt. People who illegally hunted in royal parks had their ears cut off, and high treason was punishable by being hung, drawn and quartered.

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1215 King John’s Magna Carta of 1215 redefined the laws of England, but has been much revised since. Only three clauses remain:

The privileges of the City of London, and The Privileges of the People are famous clauses that establish the principle that no one, not even the king, is above the law. "No free man shall be seized, imprisoned, dispossessed, outlawed, exiled or ruined in any way" "Nor in any way proceeded against, except by the lawful judgement of his peers and the law of the land". These clauses are considered the foundation of the freedom of the individual against arbitrary authority. They established the right of all to be judged by their equals and provided the basis for important principles in English law Habeas Corpus and access to court: Trial by Jury.

Graham entertained his audience with many historical facts & figures, interspersed with gruesome details of punishments. Wandering minstrels were to be “grievously whipped and burned through the gristle of the right ear with a hot iron of the compass of an inch about”. But most shocking to many was the treatment of suicide victims (the crime: “Felo De Se”). The body was dragged through the streets, and buried at night at a crossroads with a stake through the heart (it was not explained why!)

Many medieval crimes were ‘hanging offences’. During the 18th century the number of crimes punishable by death rose to about 200. Some, such as treason or murder, were serious crimes, but later, people could also be sentenced to death for more minor offences:- picking pockets, stealing bread or cutting down a tree. These were the kinds of crime likely to be committed by those in most desperate need.

But there were routes to escape the noose. By claiming “Benefit of Clergy”, many defendants found guilty of certain felonies were spared the death penalty. This was originally a right accorded to the church to punish its own members should they be convicted of a crime. If the defendant could read a passage from The Bible, they were instead handed over to church officials.

And many were sentenced to Transportation to the Colonies instead. Originally to America - some 60,000 until the War of Independence, then to Australia - 172,000 or more. Many of them eventually did well for themselves, and this eventually stopped when it was realised that many convicts were getting too rich from Gold prospecting! Historian Pip Wright records that out of 1000 persons sentenced to be hanged in Suffolk only 170 were executed (with transportation as an alternative until 1868) and reduction of capital offences after 1820.

Graham outlined our legal heritage, particularly the part Suffolk and Bury St Edmunds have played in it, leading the town motto of BSE to include “cradle of the law”. He related local events particularly the role magistrates have played in this history: from 1572, JP’s were also required to administer the ‘Poor Laws’, and provide a small income for the most needy from local taxation. He talked about some of his more unusual experiences on the bench, and how crime has changed over the years - but how many of the underlying problems are still the same. This was a fascinating talk from an excellent speaker.