Mr. M'CALLUM SCOTTasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been 1864 called to the proceedings in the county of London Sessions in regard to three prisoners, Davis, Smith, and Page, accused of attempted housebreaking; whether he is aware that two of the prisoners alleged that they had been induced to commit the offence by the third prisoner, who was in the pay of the police, and who had been allowed by them to escape; is he aware of the conclusions of the chief inspector who had investigated the stated by the learned magistrate, namely, that with regard to some of the allegations which they made the chief inspector believes their statement to be true, and that, in regard to the suggestion that the police instigated this crime, the most careful inquiry has been made, with every desire that justice should be done, and the chief inspector is of opinion that no charge of collusion, in the sense of the police tempting the prisoner to this crime, is made out at all; and whether, in the interests both of the police and of the public, he will publish the report of the chief inspector or institute an independent inquiry into all the circumstances of the case?
§ Mr. CHURCHILLThe matter was thoroughly investigated at the request of the learned Chairman of the London Sessions, and he agrees with me in thinking that while it is impossible to settle with any certainty what were the relations which existed between the three prisoners, there is no ground for believing the police to have been guilty of any such improper action as was alleged by Davis and Smith. I am not prepared to publish police reports which are of a strictly confidential character, and I see no reason for any further action in the matter.
Mr. M'CALLUM SCOTTHas the right hon. Gentleman's attention been drawn to the fact that the acquittal of the charge of collusion is limited to one particular-sense of the word "collusion," and whether he does not think in the interests of the police that the imputation that they were guilty of collusion in some other sense should be removed by some kind of public inquiry?
§ Mr. CHURCHILLI looked into the case at the time when the learned Chairman drew my attention to it, and he postponed the final decision pending investigation, and looked into it very carefully. The matter is much too complicated to be answered at Question time, but I am satisfied no ground arises for any further I action.
Mr. M'CALLUM SCOTTHas the right hon. Gentleman heard of the existence of a professional gentleman known as a "copper's nark"?
§ Mr. CHURCHILLYes, Sir, I have.
§ Mr. WILLIAM THORNEWhat are his duties?