"Stolen" Pup

Extraordinary Case of C. S.

Ramsay, of Tonga

By A. Cowley, Nukualofa

WILL you please give all possible publicity to the case of Mr. C. S.

Ramsay, a well-known resident of Tonga, who was sentenced by Judge W.

H. Stuart to six months’ imprisonment for the theft of a puppy. It was shown that the puppy wandered away from its native owner, and that when it appeared at the home of Mr. Ramsay he fed and cared for it, for about three weeks.

I was in Court throughout the pro ceedings, and I unhesitatingly declare that a fair hearing by the Court was im possible on account of personal ill-feeling.

The Judge was appointed a “Com petent Authority” to permit or forbid the importation of commodities into Tonga during the war. Ramsay incurred his ire in connection with this matter. Add to this that Ramsay stands in the relation ship of Uncle to Fanny Ramsay (who was maligned during the Uliti trial) and you have some explanation of this amazing treatment of Ramsay.

The so-called trial was extraordinary.

The Judge brow-beat witnesses, branded them as “liars”; burlesque, combined with sneering sarcasm, in which Ramsay was caricatured and made to appear ridiculous as a rescuer of half-starved puppies.

Amid it all there was not one tittle of evidence that the puppy had ever been confined or tied up: the evidence showed that the puppy had simply attached it self to the combined places of Ramsay and the adjoining butchery: that it at all times was free to come and go at will. Ramsay had transgressed the law by selling a bottle of liquor to a sick native at Niua Fo’ou many years ago, and this was raked up against him.

There was no moral issue involved.

The case calls for a re-hearing before an impartial tribunal as soon as possible.

The puppy has been killed by a lorry, and Stuart and his wife were reported as drowned in the mishap to the “Rangi tane”.

On arrival in Tonga, the Judge was a large purchaser of furniture and effects of the late George Scott. The order to proceed to British Guiana did not afford much time in which to dispose of things,

and Judge Stuart asked the Government to relieve him of the furniture. (I am giving his own version, as narrated to me personally.) The Government was favourable, and had an official value the effects. At the eleventh hour he re ceived a curt intimation that the Gov ernment would not buy. I was at Judge Stuart’s house the day he sentenced Ramsay, and both he and his wife were in a delirium of rage at the Govern ment’s refusal to purchase. I am pre pared to say that the Judge was not in any condition to deal justly and impar tially with any matter requiring calm and balanced judgment.