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![handle is hein.slavery/ssactsengr0538 and id is 1 raw text is: DEARS. & BELL 523. REGINA V. BENITO LOPEZ 1105
no mistrial. The mistake is not a mistake of the man, but only of his name. The
very man who, having been duly summoned, and being duly qualified, looked upon
the prisoner, and was corporeally presented and shewn to the prisoner for challenge,
was sworn and acted as juryman. At bottom the objection is but this, that the
officer of the Court, the juryman being present, called and addressed him by a wrong
name. Now it is an old and rational maxim of law that where the party to a trans-
action, or the subject of a transaction, are either of them actually and corporeally
present, the calling of either by a wrong name is immaterial. Praesentia corporis
tollit errorem nominis. Lord Bacon, in his maxims (Reguls, 25), fully explains and
copiously illustrates this rule of law and good sense, and shews how it applies, not
only to persons but to things. In this case, as soon as the prisoner omitted the
challenge, and thereby in effect said, I do not object to the juryman there standing,
there arose a compact between the Crown and the prisoner that the individual
juryman there standing corporeally present should try the case. It matters not,
therefore, that some of the accidents [523] of that individual, such as his name, his
address, his occupation, should have been mistaken. Constat de corpore, and that
is enough, at least where the juryman is duly qualified and summoned. Suppose the
name by which the juryman is now called not to be the name of himself or of anyone
else, that amounts but to this, that he is so called by that name improperly. Suppose
the wrong name to be a name by which another or others are called, can it make any
difference in principle ? Suppose a bearer of that name is to be found, not only in
England, but in the county, or on the panel. In all these cases there is a possibility,
and various degrees of probability, of prejudice, or perhaps more properly speaking,
of improbability, but a mere possibility of prejudice cannot vitiate the trial ; for, if
so, a wrong addition, or any other misdescription of the juryman, when called into
the box, would be a fatal objection to the trial. The case in the note to Hill v. Yates
(12 East, 229) seems to me to confirm this view, and to be a solemn decision by all the
Judges of England seventy-five years ago, that, notwithstanding some earlier cases,
a mistake of this nature is no mistrial. If another rule is once introduced new trials
in criminal cases will come in like a flood. It is in vain to say that greater care
should be used. Wise and practical regulations must contemplate and provide for
the occasional oversight and inadvertences which by the law of chances are certain
to happen among the thousands of criminal trials before all sorts of jurisdictions every
year in England. Moreover, if a mistake of this nature vitiate a verdict against a
prisoner, it equally vitiates a verdict for him. The Crown may at any time, and at
any distance of time, [524] take a similar objection, and the validity of all acquittals,
past and future, is put in jeopardy. I also entertain considerable doubt whether
the statute authorizes this Court to grant a venire de novo.
Lord Campbell C. J.-There being eight Judges in favour of affirming the con-
viction and six of a contrary opinion ; the conviction is therefore affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.
[525] 1858.
REGINA V. BENITO LOPEZ.
REGINA V. CHRISTIAN SATTLER.
(An English ship on the high seas is part of the territory of England ; and a foreigner
on board such ship is subject to our laws, and therefore, if he there does an act
which is a criminal offence by the law of England, he is amenable to that law,
and may, by virtue of section 21 of the 18 & 19 Viet. c. 91, be tried for the offence
before any Court of justice in the Queen's dominions having cognizance of such
crimes if committed within its limits, within whose jurisdiction he may be
brought ; for when so brought he is, within the meaning of that section, found
within such jurisdiction. Neither the liability of a foreigner to punishment for
an offence committed by him in an English ship on the high seas, nor the
jurisdiction of the Courts of this country to try him for such offence, is affected
by the fact that he was illegally and by force taken on board the ship and there
illegally detained at the time of the commission of the offence, unless the act
charged was committed for the purpose of releasing himself from illegal duress;
and, therefore, where a foreigner, who was arrested in a foreign town and forced
on board an English ship, while kept in custody in such ship on the high seas,
killed the officer who arrested him out of malice prepense and not with a view](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.slavery/ssactsengr0538&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)