Absence of Jury System in N. G.

Letter to the Editor.

PUBLIC opinion in New Guinea is uneasy owing to the scant attention paid by Canberra to our many grievances; and also owing to the failure to provide us with the jury system.

Many men are tried here for capital of fences, by one judge. This is not con sistent with the generally accepted idea of British justice.

Reply may be made that we have our Legislative Council to make representation to the proper quarter, but at the last ses sion of the Council, a non-official member

said, “I take it that your answer is that this Legislative Council, apart from being an avenue for public opinion, is a farce.*’

The answer referred to was made by the Crown Law Officer, who should be con sidered capable of answering correctly.

Another non-official member stated in Council, in the same session: “I have neither the time nor the intention to take further part in a thing which is purely futile.” With the official members in the majority—all heads of Government depart ments, and wielding a vote en bloc—it is

not only futile, but extremely costly to the taxpayers.

If it is the policy of the Administration here to oppose the granting of the jury system to New Guinea, it is sheer folly to expect a vote in favour of same from the Legislative Council. The support of pub lic opinion in Australia is needed to assist us to win this redress. With such a large white population as there is in and around Rabaul, why should we be without a jury?

The other angle, of course, is repre sented in the ridiculous sentences imposed on natives, convicted of attacks on white men. Let me give chapter and verse.

A native entered the bedroom of a white man (a returned Australian soldier) in the night and brutally bashed and battered his head in, whilst he was asleep, killing him instantly. The native was sentenced to five years, but every boy in the Islands —and news of this description travels apace—was confident he would not serve more than eighteen months, which I be lieve was the actual period of imprison ment. Compare the punishment for this cold-blooded premeditated murder and Larkin’s ten years for a flogging adminis tered in the heat of the moment. In the “Rabaul Times” report of the Larkin case, it states that the judge said: “One case of this description is worse than ten such cases reversed,” or words to that effect.

This is interpreted as meaning that it is worse for a white man to kill one native than for a native to kill ten white men.

Luckily for the white community few of the natives can read.

A one-armed, defenceless white man was killed by an armed native. The native’s first blow struck off the white man’s only arm and then, utterly incapable of putting up any defence, the white was literally hacked to pieces by the native. He had more than a dozen wounds, any one of which would have proved fatal. The native was sentenced to five years, and was soon at liberty, thanks to generous remissions of sentence, and returned a hero to his village, which is situated close to the scene of his brutal murder of a defenceless crippled white man.

In another case an ex-District Officer was given his morning tea impregnated with a most deadly and extremely painful poison. A native admitted his guilt. His “provocation” was that, instead of being allowed to go in a boat, he was told by his employer, the ex-D.O., to stay and help in the house. This native served ten months in a rest house, miscalled gaol, and also returned home a hero.

To equalise all this “justice,” cultured white men, holding responsible positions satisfactorily for years, are given savage sentences on purely native evidence not withstanding the fact that the New Guinea Crown Law Officer caused a letter to be written stating that he fully realised that native evidence was worthless and un reliable. Yet in the same letter he (the C.L.O.) refused to proceed against a native for perjury—evidently to back his asser tion that the natives “know not what they say.”

Yet white men are convicted almost daily on native evidence; and Larkin is serving ten years and many other good Australians serving almost as long sen tences in Australian gaols. If a Royal Commission were appointed to investigate the legal position in New Guinea, I quite fail to see how the Commission would fail to quash a considerable number of the con victions of white men, and heavily increase the punishment doled out to natives.

I am, etc.,

Duk Duk.

Rabaul. 30/10/34.