| Thomas Brown, Church-row, Aldgate. Henry Septimus Wollaston, Devonshire-street. George Spedding, Upper Thames-street. George Miles, Gracechurch-street. John Parker, Broad-street. Lewis Loyd, Lothbury. John Peter Robinson, Austin Friars. John Hodgson, New Broad-street. Thomas Wilson Hetherington, Nicholas-lane. Richard Hall, Lawrence-lane. Richard Cheesewright, King-street. John Green, Suffolk-lane. |
| Merchants. |
The Indictment was opened by Mr. ADOLPHUS.
Mr. GURNEY.
May it please your Lordship.
Gentlemen of the Jury.
It is my duty, as Counsel for this Prosecution, to state to you the facts which I shall have to lay before you, and to apply those facts to the several Defendants, and to the Charges contained in the Indictment, which has been opened by my learned Friend; and, Gentlemen, I am sure that it is unnecessary for me to request that you will dismiss from your minds every thing that you may have heard upon this subject before you entered that Box. It is one of the circumstances which necessarily attends a free press, that many cases which come under the consideration of a Court of Justice, shall previously have undergone some public discussion; without blame to any one, that will sometimes occur from the nature and publicity of the case itself. It does also sometimes occur, that they who are accused, industriously circulate matters which they consider as useful to their defence; and even on the very eve of trial, force them into public notice. If any thing has fallen under your observation, either on the one side or the other, I intreat you to lay it totally aside; to come to the consideration of this subject with cool, dispassionate, unprejudiced, unprepossessed minds, to attend to the evidence that will be laid before you, and to that evidence alone—by that evidence let the Defendants stand or fall.
Gentlemen, it would be very extraordinary indeed, if it could ever have been supposed by any person, even the most ignorant, that this was not a crime. It would be a disgrace to any civilized country, if its laws were so defective. If that which has been done by these Defendants in conspiracy, had been done by any one of them singly, it would have been unquestionably a crime; but when done by conspiracy, it is a crime of a more aggravated nature—To circulate false news, much more to conspire to circulate false news with intent to raise the price of any commodity whatever, is, by the Law of England, a crime, and its direct and immediate tendency is to the injury of the public. If it be with intent to raise the price of the public funds of the country, considering the immense magnitude of those funds, and, consequently, the vast extent of the injury which may be produced, the offence is of a higher description. The persons who must be necessarily injured in a case of that kind, are various; the common bona fide purchaser who invests his money—the public, through the commissioners for the redemption of the national debt—the persons whose affairs are under the care of the Court of Chancery, and whose money is laid out by the Accountant General, all these may be injured by a temporary rise of the public funds, growing out of a conspiracy of this kind; and, Gentlemen, this is no imaginary statement of mine, for it will appear to you to-day, that all these persons were in fact injured by the temporary rise produced by this conspiracy. Undoubtedly the public funds will be affected by rumours, which may be considered as accidental; in proportion as they are liable to that, it becomes more important to protect them against fraud.