§ In the Title, line 1, leave out from ("Act") to the second ("to")
§ Page 1, line 9, leave out Clause 1.
§ Page 53 line 36, leave out Clause 58.
§ Page 66, leave out line 15.
§ The Commons disagreed to the above Amendments but proposed the following Amendments to the Bill in lieu thereof—
§ In the Title, line 1, leave out ("suspend the death") and insert ("amend the law relating to the")
§
Page 1, line 9, leave out subsection (1) and insert:
("1.—(1) During the continuance in force of this section, no person shall be sentenced by a court to death for murder unless it is charged in the indictment or inquisition and found by the jury that the murder was committed with express malice as defined by this section, and either—
§ (2) Where, by virtue of the foregoing subsection, a court is precluded from passing sentence of death on a person convicted of murder, the court shall sentence the offender to imprisonment for life.
§ (3) If in any indictment or inquisition for murder it is charged that the accused has been convicted of murder committed on a previous occasion, the accused shall in the first instance be arraigned on so much only of the indictment or inquisition as charges the murder for which he is to be tried; and if on arraignment he pleads guilty or is found guilty by the jury, the jury shall, unless he pleads guilty to having been previously convicted as aforesaid, be charged to inquire whether he has been so convicted, and in that case it shall not be necessary to swear the jury again.
§ (4) For the purposes of this section, a murder shall be deemed in relation to every person guilty thereof, to be committed with express malice if the act causing the death is done with intent to kill or maim any person, and in the latter case is an act which might reasonably be expected to endanger life.
§ (5) For the avoidance of doubt it is hereby declared that where a person is charged with murder on an indictment or inquisition charging any of the matters specified in subsection (1) of this section, and the jury are of opinion that those matters are not established by the evidence but that the accused is shown by the evidence to be guilty of murder or any other offence of which a person charged with murder may lawfully be convicted, the jury may return a verdict of guilty of murder or of any such other offence as aforesaid.")
§
Page 2, line 3, at end insert:
("(7) This section shall apply to Scotland, subject to the following modifications—
- (a) for any reference to the Prison Acts, 1865 to 1898, there shall be substituted a reference to the Prison (Scotland) Acts, 1860 to 1904, and for any reference to section fifty-three of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933, there shall be substituted a reference to section fifty-seven of the Children and Young Persons (Scotland) Act. 1937;
- (b) any reference to imprisonment for life shall be construed as a reference to penal servitude for life;
- (c) for the purpose of establishing that a person charged with murder has been convicted of murder committed on a previous occasion section sixty-six of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1887 shall apply and such conviction shall be deemed to have been found by the jury if it is admitted by the accused or is held to apply to him in pursuance of that section or is proved in accordance with the provisions thereof;
- (d) subsections (3) and (5) shall be omitted and the following subsection shall be inserted after subsection (2)—
'(3) During the continuance in force of this section, sections two and three of the Criminal Law (Scotland) Act, 1829 (which make punishable by death certain crimes of violence against His Majesty's subjects), shall be construed as requiring the court to sentence any person convicted of any of the crimes therein set forth to penal servitude for life.'")
§ Page 2, line 19, leave out subsection (4).
§ Page 67, line 1, at end insert the following new Schedule: