King's House mango thief had better luck
Published:Tuesday | November 29, 2011 | 12:00 AM
THE EDITOR, Sir:
A young man has just been sentenced to three months' hard labour for stealing four dozen ackees from the King's House property.
The incident reminds me of a similar case mentioned in Jackie Ranston's excellent book, which reveals stories behind the scenes at King's House. It happened in the summer of 1902, but the colonial magistrate was more lenient and had the boy bound over "to keep the peace and be of good behaviour or serve three months in jail".
Mr Ranston's gripping, must-read document covering the period 1873-2010 did not elaborate on this incident. However, her account whetted my appetite, and I was persuaded to search for more when I observed that modern-day justice had imposed a straight custodial sentence on the ackee pilferer.
Breaking the rules
Historic records tell us that on a morning in May 1902, Mr Herbert Sisnett, private secretary to Governor Sir Augustus Hemming, came upon two boys in possession of two mangoes on the King's House grounds. One, an employee there for 11 years, was asked what he was doing, and he replied that his companion had asked him for a mango and that they both intended to eat the fruits.
The secretary insisted that the employee had picked the mangoes in defiance of a rule that " ... no employee should pull mangoes from the tree but could take them off the ground". He went on to say that the mangoes were to be sold; and he had the fellow immediately arrested.
The St Andrew magistrate who heard the case said he believed the boy had committed an offence; so he found him guilty and passed sentence. As in the present case, the matter aroused a good deal of criticism and one letter writer to the newspaper questioned the verdict, asking, "How many mangoes are sold for a quattie at King's House, and do the results of the sales go to general revenue?"
The letter writer also wanted to know " ... of what was the boy (who picked instead of picking up the mangoes) convicted? It certainly was not larceny, for the magistrate stated that he was convinced that the boy picked the fruit, not that he stole, took and carried it away. To my mind it seems that the boy has had a conviction recorded against him for breaking one of the Government House rules ... ."
More than 100 years have passed since the case of the governor's mangoes; and some still argue: Was it a violation of the Larceny Act which describes the guilty as a person " ... who, without the consent of the owner ... takes and carries away anything capable of being stolen ... ." Incidentally, Mr Sisnett went on to become a puisne judge in Jamaica and was later chief justice of British Honduras.
KEN JONES