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by the Commonwealth Atty. Just as though there was no defence, or could possibly be any. The retiring of the Jury was momentarily detained by a request of the Defendant to the court to be allowed to ask the witnesses on the part of the prosecution a few questions. This request met with such opposition from the Commonwealth Atty, and indifference of the Court, to use no harsher term, that the Military Commissioner, and myself advised the Defence in a whisper, that if no disposition was further shown in favor of hearing the evidence of the defence, that he should just let them have their way for the time. I thought at the time and think so still, that no matter what evidence had been brought before them, forced upon them it would of had no weight in the case. This whole trial (?) did not occupy more than twenty five minutes. The damages assessed by Judgment of the Court so as against Morton Roberts $500.00 Macajah Bryant $150.00, and some eight or ten others $50.00 each. Whether there was Justice in this Judgement can best be seen by comparing it with a case tried some few days before, in the Hustings Court of this City, in which a colored man sued two white

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---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-12-18 18:25:26