HC Deb 14 February 1895 vol 30 cc722-4
CAPTAIN M'CALMONT (Antrim, S.)

I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether Alderman Edmund Walsh, who has been selected by the Lord Lieutenant to fill the office of High Sheriff of the City of Cork, is the same Alderman Walsh as was challenged by the Crown and ordered to stand aside, when the jury was being sworn at the recent Assizes, for the trial of Eugéne Keeffe on the capital charge?

MR. J. MORLEY

Alderman Edmund Walsh was ordered by the Crown Solicitor to stand aside in the case referred to. It would be without precedent and inexpedient to mention the reasons which weighed with the Crown Solicitor in the exercise of his discretion. As to his having been selected by the Lord Lieutenant to fill the office of High Sheriff, I may observe that he was named first on the list of three persons nominated under the Statute by the City of Cork Town Council to fill the office of High Sheriff, and the Lord Lieutenant took the first name on the list.

CAPTAIN M'CALMONT

I should like to know whether this Gentleman, in the opinion of the Law Officers of the Crown, is not competent to find a verdict in accordance with the evidence, and in accordance with the oath, and whether this same gentleman will now have the framing of the jury panel for the City of Cork?

MR. J. MORLEY

For many reasons, I understand, a juryman on the panel may be ordered to stand aside. There may be certain questions of prejudice or local connection, and so forth, which may render it undesirable that a person should serve, but I do not know whether those were the reasons which actuated the Crown Solicitor in the present case. Those reasons may be quite inconsistent with the reasons which may actuate the Town Council of the City of Cork in nominating Sheriffs.

MR. MAURICE HEALY

Is there any precedent for allowing a gentleman to serve on a jury panel of which he is in charge?

DR. KENNY

Is it not a fact that a High Sheriff is, by his office, precluded from serving on a jury?

CAPTAIN M'CALMONT

Is it not a fact that this gentleman was challenged by the Crown about the middle of December, and that he did not enter on his office as High Sheriff till January 1st?

MR. J. MORLEY

I must ask that that question be put down. I have answered all that is material to the point raised in the question on the Paper.