Procedure against Parent or other Person party to the Indenture.]-The court of summary jurisdiction may direct "any person liable under the instrument of apprenticeship for the good conduct of the apprentice" (meaning, it is to be presumed, a person covenanting to that effect with the master) to be summoned, in like manner as if he were the defendant, to attend the hearing of any proceeding in relation to a dispute between a master and an apprentice. And the court, in addition to or in substitution for any order which the court is authorized to make against the apprentice, may order the person so summoned to pay damages for any breach of the contract of apprenticeship. The court may accept the security of the person summoned, or any other person, for the performance by the apprentice of "his contract of apprenticeship," instead of or in mitigation of any punishment which it is authorized to inflict upon the apprentice (m). See forms of application for and summons of "bondsman" for an apprentice, and also of order on him to pay damages, in the Chancellor's orders. The words "instead of or in mitigation of any punishment" indicate the power to summon the third party on an application for an order of imprisonment of the apprentice, for on the original hearing of a dispute the court has no power to inflict any punishment (n); and the form of acceptance, given by the orders, confirms this view. (m) 38 & 39 Vict. c. 90, s. 7. (n) See the preceding observations in the text on the enforcement of an order against an apprentice for the performance of his duties. CHAPTER VIII. PROCEDURE UNDER THE CONSPIRACY AND PROTECTION OF PROPERTY ACT, 1875. § 1. Offences under the Act. THE offences defined and punishable by the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, 1875, may be thus shortly stated in the order they occur in the act: (1.) Wilfully and maliciously breaking a contract of service with a municipal authority or company or contractor having the duty of supplying any city, borough, town or place, or any part thereof, with gas or water, knowing or having reasonable cause to believe that the probable consequences of so doing, either alone or in combination with others, will be to deprive the inhabitants of that city, borough, town, place or part, wholly or to a great extent, of their supply of gas or water (a). (2.) Wilfully and maliciously breaking a contract of service or of hiring, knowing or having reasonable cause to believe that the probable consequences of so doing, either alone or in combination with others, will be to endanger human life, or cause serious bodily injury, or to expose valuable property, whether real or personal, to destruction or serious injury (b). (3.) A master, who being legally liable to provide for his servant or apprentice necessary food, clothing, medical aid or lodging, wilfully and without lawful excuse refuses or neglects to provide the same, whereby the health of the (a) 38 & 39 Vict. c. 86. As to the definition of "municipal authority," "company" and "contractor," sce sect. 14; and of municipal au thority in Scotland, sect. 18; and servant or apprentice is or is likely to be seriously or permanently injured (c). (4.) Every person who, with a view to compel any other person to abstain from doing or to do any act which such other person has a legal right to do or abstain from doing, wrongfully and without legal authority, 1. Uses violence to or intimidates such other person or his wife or children, or injures his property; or 2. Persistently follows such other person about from place to place; or 3. Hides any tools, clothes or other property owned or used by such other person, or deprives him of or hinders him in the use thereof; or 4. Watches or besets the house or other place where such other person resides, or works, or carries on business, or happens to be, or the approach to such house or place (d); or 5. Follows such other person with two or more other persons in a disorderly manner, in or through any street or road (e). Of the above four principal classes of offences, the first and second classes may be regarded as in substitution of the fourteenth section of the Master and Servant Act, 1867 (ƒ). The word "maliciously," used in reference to these offences, is to be construed in the same manner as is required by sect. 58 of the Malicious Injuries to Property Act, 24 & 25 Vict. c. 97, in reference to offences under that act, that is to say, the punishment and forfeiture equally apply "whether the offence shall be committed (c) 38 & 39 Vict. c. 86, s. 6. (d) Attending at or near the house or place where a person resides, or works, or carries on business, or happens to be, or the approach to such house or place, in order merely to obtain or communicate information, is not a watching or besetting within the meaning of this section. (e) Id. s. 6. (f) See ante, pp. 20, 93. from malice conceived against the owner of the property in respect of which it shall be committed or otherwise"(g). (g) Notwithstanding this interpretation it is probable that questions will be raised as to the precise effect of the word "maliciously " in the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, 1875. "Malice, in common acceptation, means ill-will against a person; but, in its legal sense, it means a wrongful act done intentionally without just cause or excuse." (Bayley, J., Bromage v. Prosser, 4 B. & C. 255.) If "maliciously" in the statute is to be read in the "common acceptation" of the word, the interpretation will merely make it immaterial whether the malice was conceived against the owner or against some third person. If it is to be read in the strict legal sense, then the interpretation clause appears to be inoperative or unnecessary. The words "either alone or in combination with others," seem to point to malice in the common acceptation" of the word. On the other hand, the words "knowing or having reasonable cause to believe that the probable consequences" will be to produce the mischief of the description mentioned, indicates that it is unnecessary that the probable result should be really present to the mind of the person wilfully breaking his contract. If a strictly legal sense, and not the popular sense, is to be given to the words "wilfully and maliciously," a larger class of cases will be included within the penal provision. In the former event two workmen drinking by common consent at a public-house during working hours, and having reasonable cause to believe that their absence will expose valuable property to serious injury, but not contemplating the result or giving it a thought, would be amenable to the law as being guilty of "a wrongful act, done intentionally, without just cause or excuse." Certainly if human life or limb or valuable property be jeopardized, there seems no moral wrong done in making such reckless conduct punishable as a crime; but can such a case constitute a wilful and malicious breach of contract? Without speculating further on the question, a case recently decided under the 24 & 25 Vict. c. 97, s. 51, may be cited as bearing somewhat upon it. That section makes it a misdemeanor "unlawfully and maliciously" to commit any damage, injury or spoil to any property to an amount exceeding 5l., for which no other punishment is provided. On an indictment under that section for unlawfully and maliciously committing damage to a window, it appeared that the defendant and others, having been turned out of a public-house for disorderly conduct, fought in the street, and the defendant picked up a large stone and threw it at the persons he had been fighting with, and the stone passing over their heads broke a plate-glass window, and doing damage to an amount exceeding 51. On a finding of the jury that he intended to strike the persons, but not intending to break the window, it was held that the defendant could not be convicted. Blackburn, J., said, "when a person wilfully does an act to the injury of another without any lawful cause, the act is malicious. The third offence (by a master of a servant or apprentice) is an extension of sect. 26 of the Offences against the Person Consolidation Act, 24 & 25 Vict. c. 100. The chief extension consists in the introduction of "seriously injured," and thus constituting it an offence if health is or is likely to be seriously injured, instead of confining it to an actual or probable permanent injury. The neglect of medical aid is also introduced, in addition to necessary food, clothing or lodging. The fourth class comprises the offences substituted for the repealed Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1871 (h). In addition to the above offences there is another, wholly the creation of the Act of 1875, but connected with offence No. 1. The act requiries every municipal authority, company or contractor, upon whom is imposed, by act of parliament, the duty, or who has assumed the duty, of supplying a place with gas or water, to cause to be posted up at the gas or waterworks a printed copy of section 4 of the act in some conspicuous place where it may be conveniently read by the persons employed; and as often as such copy becomes defaced, obliterated or destroyed, to cause it to be renewed with all reasonable despatch. A municipal authority, or company, or contractor making default in relation to such notice, incurs a liability on summary conviction to a penalty not exceeding five pounds for every day during which such default continues; and every person who unlawfully injures, defaces Here the act was without lawful excuse; but was it wilful? Upon the facts there was evidence upon which the jury might have found if they had been so directed that the act was malicious. If they had found that the prisoner was aware that the window was where it was, and that he was likely to break it, and was reckless whether he did so or not, the case might have been different, but they were not so directed, and have not so found. They have found that he did not intend to break the window. Therefore I think this conviction must be quashed." The Queen v. Pembliton, Law Rep. 2 C. C. R. 119; 43 L. J., M. C. 91. See further, The Queen v. Ward, Law Rep. 1 C. C. R. 356; 41 L. J., M. C. 69; and post, p. 274. (h) See ante, p. 40, and p. 96. |