§ MR. ANNAN BRYCE (Inverness Burghs)I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland whether he is aware that the sentence on Joseph Hume, condemned to death at Aberdeen for a murder committed in Morayshire, is, under the Judge's order to be carried out at Inverness where no execution has taken place for seventy-three years, and where the prison is in the middle of a residential district, and that a very strong feeling has been aroused in Inverness against this arrangement, whether he can, and if so, will, order the venue to be changed, or failing this whether he will give instructions that the tolling of the bell and display of the black flag be dispensed with.
§ MR. SINCLAIRThe practice is for the sentence of death to be carried out in the prison for the district in which the crime was committed. Hume committed murder in the County of Elgin, and Inverness prison is the prison for that county. Accordingly, the magistrates of Inverness are, in terms of the Warrant by the High Court, charged with the execution of the capital sentence Instructions have been given for the tolling of the bell to be dispensed with on this occasion.