M'Intyre v Morton
| Jurisdiction | Scotland |
| Judgment Date | 21 June 1912 |
| Docket Number | No. 12. |
| Date | 21 June 1912 |
| Court | High Court of Justiciary |
Lord Justice-General, Lord Kinnear, Lord Mackenzie.
Statutory Offences—Frequenting public place with intent to commit felony—‘Place adjacent to a street or highway’—Hotel—Vagrancy Act, 1824 (5 Geo. IV. cap. 83), sec. 4—Prevention of Crimes Act, 1871 (34 and 35 Vict. cap. 112), sec. 15.
The Vagrancy Act, 1824, sec. 4, as amended and applied to Scotland by the Prevention of Crimes Act, 1871, sec. 15, includes among those who are liable to imprisonment as rogues or vagabonds ‘every suspected person or reputed thief frequenting … any street or any highway, or any place adjacent to a street or highway, with intent to commit felony.’
Heldthat the entrance hall and staircase of the Central Station Hotel in Glasgow, which opened directly on to a public street, was a place adjacent to a street or highway in the sense of these sections.
On 20th January 1912 Bertrand Morton aliasEdward Guerin was charged in the Central Police Court at Glasgow on a complaint at the instance of John James M'Intyre, Procurator-fiscal, which set forth that ‘you are charged at the instance of the complainer that, being a suspected person and reputed thief, you did, on the 27th day of October 1911, frequent and loiter about in the Central Railway Station Hotel, being a place adjacent to a street, namely, Gordon Street, Glasgow, with intent to commit felony, videlicet:—Theft, contrary to section 4 of the Vagrancy Act, 1824, as amended and extended to Scotland by the Prevention of Crimes Act, 1871, section 15, and as further amended by the Penal Servitude Act, 1891, section 7, whereby you are liable to imprisonment for a period not exceeding three calendar months with hard labour. And further, being a suspected person and reputed thief, you did, on the 16th day of January 1912, frequent and loiter about in the Central Railway Station Hotel, being a place adjacent to a street, namely, Gordon Street, Glasgow, with intent to commit felony, videlicet:—Theft, contrary to section 4 of the Vagrancy Act, 1824, as amended and extended to Scotland by the Prevention of Crimes Act, 1871, section 15, and as further amended by the Penal Servitude Act, 1891, section 7, whereby you are liable to imprisonment for a period not exceeding three calendar months with hard labour.’*
On 23rd January 1912 the Stipendiary Magistrate (Neilson) found the charge not proven, and, at the request of the Procurator-fiscal, stated a case for the opinion of the High Court.
The case stated:—‘The case was called before the Central Police Court, Glasgow, on 20th January 1912, when respondent, who was not represented by an agent, pled not guilty. My attention was not called to any question of relevancy, and I allowed the case to go to proof. Proof was led, but at the end of the hearing, on my referring closely to the terms of the statutes founded upon, I thought it necessary to adjourn the case until 23rd January, and ultimately determined to give an opportunity to the Procurator-fiscal and to any law-agent who might appear for respondent to discuss a point of law and fact which had emerged. On 23rd January I heard the Procurator-fiscal and the law-agent for respondent, after which I found the charge not proven.
‘The following are the facts proved:—The respondent is a suspected person and reputed thief. On 16th January 1912 he frequented and loitered about in the Central Railway Station Hotel, one entrance to which is situated in Gordon Street, Glasgow. He was observed examining the hotel register, which is kept lying in the entrance hall on the ground floor, looking at the keyboard where the keys of unoccupied rooms and keys of rooms left by residents in the hotel were hung, and at the telegraph board. Several times he went up and down the main stair. He was also in the smoke-room, lounge-room, and lavatory on the first floor or entresol of the hotel. He was in the hotel for about an hour, but he did not reside there, and did not know anyone residing there. Although while in the hotel he did no act in itself illegal or overtly indicative of an unlawful purpose he gave no satisfactory explanation of his being in the hotel. His movements were such as to rouse the suspicions of the hotel servants...
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