§ MR. SHERRIFFasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been directed to the Report of the case of Robert Gordon, a child eight years of age, who for placing a few pebbles on the Midland Railway has been sentenced by the Reverend G. E. Gray, Chairman of the Alcester Bench of Magistrates, to one month's imprisonment and five years in a reformatory; and, whether he will make further inquiry into the circumstances of the case, and take such steps as he may deem necessary?
MR. ASSHETON CROSS, in reply, said, that he had made an inquiry into the case. It was quite true that such a sentence was passed upon this boy, who did place eight pebbles upon the railway, and that, he need hardly say, was a very dangerous practice, and must be put a stop to. This boy had been several times cautioned, not for putting pebbles on the railway, but for throwing stones at trains when passing. The magistrates acted, he felt sure, upon a deep sense of responsibility of what they thought was right. He believed that one, if not two, of the boy's brothers had been sent to a reformatory, in order to remove them from the influence of their parents. In this case, however, the magistrates had exceeded their powers, as the boy, being under the age of 10 years, they were not justified in sending him to a reformatory except he had been previously charged for a like offence; and though it appeared he had been charged with a like offence by a police-constable, yet he had not been charged in the sense required by the Act of Parliament, and therefore he (Mr. Cross) had remitted that part of the sentence. He had himself a horror of sending children to prison. No doubt, the best thing that could have been done would have been to give the boy a sound whipping. He was in communication with the visiting justices as to what should be done with the boy, and he should be disposed to act upon their recommendations as to his release after a certain period.