125-NLR-NLR-V-47-JOHN-Appellant-and-POLICE-Respondent.pdf
DE SILVA J.—John v. Police.
369
1946Present:de Silva J.
JOHN, Appellant, and POLICE, Respondent.
469—M. C. Colombo, 13,295.
Sentence—False allegations made by accused, against the Police—Not a groundfor enhancing sentence.
When imposing sentence on an accused the Court should not beinfluenced by the circumstance that the accused made some false allega-tions against the Police.
PPEAL against a conviction from the Magistrate’s Court, Colombo.
M. M. K. Svbramaniam, for the accused, appellant.
J.G. T. WeerarcUne, C.C., for the Attorney-General.
June 26, 1946. de Silva J.—
In this case, the accused has been convicted of having had in his posses-sion 1} lbs. of made tea valued at R>s. 2 suspected to have been stolen fromthe Lake Side Warehouse, Colombo, and sentenced to rigorous imprison-ment for a term of three months.
The conviction is supported by the evidence, and there is no reason tointerfere with it, but the Magistrate appears to have been influenced,in imposing a sentence of three months’ rigorous imprisonment, by thecircumstance that the accused made some utterly false allegations againstthe Police. This, in my opinion, is not a circumstance which should betaken into consideration in punishing the accused for the offence com-mitted by him. If he has committed any other offence by making falseallegations, he should be charged and punished for that separately.The accused has no previous convictions and, in view of the triflingvalue of the goods stolen, I would set aside the sentence of imprisonmentand sentence him to pay a fine of Rs. 100 or in default three months’rigorous imprisonment.
Sentence altered.