the procedure by which a law-breaker is convicted for his offence begins with his arrest and ends with the formal pronouncement of sentence against him after he has been declared guilty. prior to his arrest he has been merely a criminal; after sentence (or, to be strictly technical, after the verdict against him) he becomes a convict; during the proceedings he is a "prisoner at the bar."
whatever has been the manner of his arrest he is in most instances taken at once before the nearest magistrate in order that the latter may inquire into the charge against him and determine whether upon the evidence there is reasonable cause to believe him guilty.[15] if the arrest takes place after four o'clock in the afternoon, or no magistrate happens to be holding court, the prisoner is locked up until the following morning.[16] if he be charged with a felony he must remain in confinement until the magistrate admits him to bail, for no police official can fix or receive bail in such cases: if, however, he has been arrested for the commission of a misdemeanor only, the sergeant on duty at "the desk" must fix the bail and give him a reasonable opportunity to procure it.
[pg 43]
if arrested while a police court is in session he is entitled to an immediate hearing, and to the services of counsel, for whom the magistrate must send, free of charge, through an officer. after the arrival of counsel or after waiting a reasonable time for his appearance, the magistrate may then proceed to examine into the case, and can only adjourn the hearing for forty-eight hours at a time for "good cause," unless at the request of the defendant himself.
the subjects of the rights of apprehended persons is too extensive to be adequately treated in a few pages. the power which the magistrate may arbitrarily exercise of holding persons merely "suspected" of crime for further examination is very great. where a prisoner is brought in under arrest as a fugitive from another state he is frequently "held" (without any formal charge being made against him) for several days at the mere telegraphic request of some police official in a distant city. the writ of habeas corpus may secure his release, but persons unjustly arrested on "suspicion" have little redress in ordinary cases, whether they are discharged immediately or held for long periods. while no technical authority exists for such detentions (the right of arrest being strictly limited as set forth in the last chapter) they are practically necessary to prevent the escape of dangerous criminals. "arrest on suspicion" is a euphemistic description of a technically illegal proceeding, which is universally recognized as necessary for the protection of society.[pg 44][17]
the police court is the great clearing house of crime. inasmuch as all persons arrested, whether innocent or guilty, are brought there together, they should naturally, so far as possible, be accorded the benefit of the doubt as to their guilt in the treatment which they receive. they are presumed to be innocent, and indeed many of them are, until a jury has declared to the contrary. however, the attitude generally taken towards a prisoner in a police court is that he is guilty and that it is useless for him to deny it, and he feels the discomfort and ignominy of his position far more at this state of the proceedings than he does later, when he is accorded more individual importance. as a rule he is brought into a crowded, stuffy court where a vociferous pair of shyster lawyers are shouting at each other's witnesses and the magistrate is with difficulty trying to preserve order. a great throng of complainants, defendants, witnesses, policemen, lawyers and idlers fill the room, and the prisoner instantly becomes the centre of vision for all eyes as the officer leads him[pg 45] up to the clerk's desk and makes his formal accusation. the altercation in front of the magistrate is suspended long enough for the latter to "commit" the defendant, who instantly finds himself locked in a narrow cell where he must remain until some friend or relation has had an opportunity to reach a lawyer, secure a bondsman, and compass his release.
what he must naturally feel most is his own insignificance. he is merely one of a huge multitude of miserable people who are all in the same box. the hours until his lawyer arrives are very dark indeed,—particularly as he probably has no idea of what is going to happen to him in the meantime. if he be a poor man accused of drunkenness or disorderly conduct he may be, and frequently is, sent to the island before he has any adequate opportunity to notify his family, who may suffer an agony of anxiety before they discover what has become of him. the punishment of the minor offender for trifling breaches of the peace is not only swift, but is characterized by a certainty unknown to that which the law attaches to crimes of a higher order.
the police court has sometimes been termed "the poor man's court of appeals." so far as this implies that five out of every seven defendants arraigned there are summarily disposed of and accept the decision or sentence of the presiding judge as final, and that the same number of aggrieved persons who seek justice there do the same, it is a correct description. no court has a more direct influence for good or evil, or for the creation of a respect or a disregard for law. for an overwhelming majority of our citizens, particularly those[pg 46] of foreign birth or extraction, it is the only court of justice in existence.[18]
there may be higher courts or higher laws but they know them not. to them the magistrate is an autocrat. they are avenged or punished by virtue of his will alone, and as he is just or unjust, honest or corrupt, so do they come to regard american institutions as a whole. the officers of the precinct are his minions, only a little lower in majesty, and even more terrible and implacable.
when it is considered that the magistrates in the first division of the city of new york (namely, the boroughs of manhattan and the bronx) alone disposed of 138,047 cases in the year 1907, and that in 104,622 of these they exercised a summary jurisdiction over the liberty of the prisoner, with power in many instances to inflict severe punishment, it will be seen that the importance of these courts cannot be easily overrated. including the defendants arraigned in the "children's court" and before certain judges of the special sessions sitting as magistrates, there were 149,494 persons arrested during 1907 in new york county alone.
the summary jurisdiction of the police judge embraces all offences classed as "disorderly conduct," violations of so-called "corporation ordinances"[pg 47] (such as peddling without a license, etc.), infractions of the "sabbath law," the disposition of persons alleged to be insane, vagrancy, and the offence (not recognized by any statute) of being a "suspicious person." any person whom the magistrate finds guilty of any of these charges (except the last) he may fine or imprison. it is quite true that the defendant may, if convicted, take an appeal to the court of general sessions or test the jurisdiction of the magistrate by a writ of habeas corpus, but the grounds of appeal are few, and the victim rarely is aware or advised of his rights in this respect. even were he fully informed, his purse would not usually permit of further proceedings, unless taken for him from charity by some outside party or organization. the fact that there were, out of this multitude of cases, but one hundred and fifty-nine appeals taken (of which only seventy-seven were successful) speaks for itself.
besides those charged with the offences over which the magistrate has final jurisdiction, before him come all persons arrested for crimes which are triable in higher courts.[19] these persons he must "hold for trial" (either for the court which tries misdemeanors or for the grand jury) or discharge. should he have reasonable ground to believe that the accused has committed the crime alleged he is obliged by law to "hold" him, but if the judge sees fit to discharge the prisoner, the aggrieved person has no appeal and his only alternative is to try to persuade the district attorney in spite of the decision of the magistrate to take personal action either by[pg 48] laying the matter before the grand jury, or in cases of misdemeanors by filing an information in the court of special sessions. he is usually unaware of this possibility and at all events it is a difficult proceeding, so that even in the case of crimes in which the magistrate has not a final jurisdiction, his action, so far as setting free the prisoner is concerned, is generally a conclusion of the matter. when a police judge unwarrantably discharges a prisoner accused of a felony the complainant rarely takes any further steps to get justice.
the enormous power wielded by what people are accustomed to call "mere police judges" is obvious when we realize that one of them may send a woman to a reformatory for three years, and boys to similar institutions for the same period. their jurisdiction is, however, strictly confined to certain classes of offences; and if, for example, the crime charged be "larceny" in any form they are compelled to hold the defendant for the action of a higher court even if he admit his guilt. thus a vagrant who is caught begging can be sent away for six months, but if the same man steal an old rug from a door-step or a gunny-sack from a wagon he must willy nilly be sent to the tombs to await a trial in special sessions. now, in any case where he is going to plead guilty he would probably vastly prefer to have his case disposed of by the magistrate and have done with it.
there would seem to be good reason for believing that coincident with other reforms in the magistrates' courts their original jurisdiction might well be extended to cases of petit larceny where the defendant admits the commission of the offence. a[pg 49] deal of time, money, and inconvenience to the prisoner might be saved. the present situation results in a tendency on the part of the judge to construe as many cases as he can of "petit larceny" into "disorderly conduct." very often a trivial theft is accompanied by acts which make it perfectly proper for the magistrate to overlook the larceny for the disorder. certainly it is better for the offender, where possible, to be classed as a "disorderly" rather than as a thief. in the latter case he may, with the stigma thus fastened upon him, go forth to a life of crime; in the first he would never be regarded as a criminal. this jurisdiction to punish any act or omission tending to create a breach of the peace offers a boundless opportunity for an arbitrary judge to arrogate to himself powers which an ignorant or helpless offender can hardly be expected successfully to defy. if illegally "committed" his only redress is a writ of habeas corpus, which probably is a phrase entirely unintelligible to him and which will cost more money to procure than he has ever had at any one time in his existence.
the magistrates might also be given jurisdiction to impose punishment in all cases of "simple assault," and in certain cases even of assaults with weapons. there is no particular reason why, if the magistrate can send an old woman away for begging, or for being drunk of a saturday night, he cannot be trusted to punish her properly for hitting her husband over the head with a hot-water kettle. moreover, the magistrate before whom the damaged party hales the offender is able to see with his own eyes the actual extent of the injuries which have been inflicted, whereas, by the time the case[pg 50] is tried before the judge of the sessions, dame nature has usually restored the victim's battered physiognomy to its pristine condition of refined elegance.
no one could fail to profit by a day spent upon the police-court bench watching the judge exercise his many diverse yet not inconsistent duties, which variously include those of magistrate, lawyer, clergyman, almoner, arbitrator of domestic difficulties, and general adviser. he will begin his day's work, which, before it be concluded, will have required him to pass upon anywhere from fifty to eighty cases, by disposing of a long line of drunks and disorderlies of both sexes. justice is plentifully tempered with mercy, however, and the unpleasant business is soon over. next comes the disposition of unfinished business, which includes the continuance of trials not concluded on the preceding court day. these, of course, embrace every possible offence known to the law. the extraordinary number of petty burglaries is sure to attract the attention of the spectator.[20] boy after boy is brought to the bar charged with breaking into a tobacco shop, or a small grocery, or a room used for the storage of merchandise, push-carts or fruit. at the very outside the value of the plunder cannot exceed a few dollars.
one defendant, his head heavily bandaged, is half carried to the bar by a husky officer and charged with attempting to burglarize the shed adjoining isadore aselovitch's junk store. he is clearly much the worse for a severe clubbing. "izzy," the com[pg 51]plainant, exhibiting an iron bar several feet in length and weighing upwards of twenty pounds, proudly claims to have effected the arrest of the defendant by merely giving him "a little poke mit it." in response to the interrogatories of the magistrate, izzy explains that he and another kept their junk in a certain rear room and from time to time noticed that various odd pieces of iron seemed to be missing. they thereupon concealed themselves behind a pile of old push-cart wheels and waited for the thief. after several hours of inactivity they finally heard a rattling among the iron and discovered the defendant apparently in the very act of stealing a crowbar. being upon his hands and knees he was unable to offer any effectual resistance to their combined onslaught and barely succeeded in escaping with his life. his cries had brought an officer who had arrested him, upon izzy's complaint, for attempted burglary. the defendant in turn had charged the two with felonious assault, alleging that he had a right to be in the store-room, inasmuch as he was accustomed to leave junk there himself. he further tearfully asserts that he is a rival of izzy's in the push-cart business, which accounts for the extreme animosity of the latter.
"it vas a lie, your honor, chuge," urges izzy. "dot man vas a purglar. he ain't got no push-cart. gif him ten years, chuge!"
the judge, who is wise in his generation, fines "the burglar" three dollars for disorderly conduct, to the intense disgust of izzy.
"tree dollars!" he cries with fine scorn. "tree dollars for a purglar! i vould be a purglar myself for tree dollars!"
[pg 52]
very likely the next case will be that of a small merchant charged with obstructing the sidewalk with his boxes. he is let off with a warning or, if it be a second offence, with a small fine. then a couple of boys will be brought in charged with "shooting craps," and on their heels a half-drunken driver who is accused by a little girl (having on an s.p.c.a. badge) of driving an overloaded horse. the crap boys are let go, but as the "cop" agrees with the little girl that the driver was abusing his horse the latter is "held" for special sessions.
while these matters are being attended to a great uproar is heard and a large crowd forces its way into the court-room. above the clamor the wails of a young jewess make themselves distinctly audible. the judge has just ordered the drunken driver locked up and is all ready to take up the new case. the defendant, a slick, pale-faced young hebrew, loudly proclaims his innocence and demands an immediate hearing. no time is lost, for the parents of the girl have procured a lawyer who at once causes a charge of robbery to be entered. the girl, hysterically weeping, tells her story. up to a certain point it is lucid enough. she had been walking along the street when a nice-looking young "feller" had accosted her and inquired the way to the nearest pawnbroker's. while they were conversing pleasantly upon this subject a second young gentleman had joined them and asked the first to purchase a pair of beautiful diamond earrings which he exhibited. this the other regretfully had explained he could not do, since he had no money (being even then on the way to the pawnbroker's). the diamonds had glistened and sparkled in the sunlight. the girl had[pg 53] asked to look at them and while she was doing so the owner had suggested that perhaps she might like to purchase them herself, giving as part of the consideration her own modest little baubles. this tempting offer she says she refused, on the ground that she did not know the young gentleman. she then rapidly states that the two set upon her, struck her, and that she "knew no more," until on recovering her senses she found that her own earrings had disappeared and that those of the stranger were in her ears.
"hm!" says the magistrate; "and do you say that the defendant struck you?"
"shure, your honor," replies the young lady.
"and that you fainted?"
"shure, your honor."
"did you fall?" inquires the judge sharply.
"n—n—no," admits the complainant.
"defendant discharged," announces the magistrate.
"get out of here, all of you," orders the officer at the bridge. "get along, now!"
the explanation, as the reader already guesses, is simply that by a time-honored trick the girl has been persuaded by an oily-tongued trickster to exchange her own earrings for his worthless ones. this she has done quite voluntarily. she has then hurried home only to find that her newly acquired gems are paste. the family goes into a paroxysm of anger and lamentation. the nearest lawyer is consulted, who, of course, agrees to secure the return of the earrings. they pay him a five-dollar fee, the defendant is sought for and arrested, and in her eagerness to see him punished and to obtain her property[pg 54] the victim swears away her own case. probably had she told the truth the defendant could have been "held" for grand larceny by false pretences.
these proceedings may no sooner be concluded than perchance a giant negro is brought in charged with assault. a dozen officers bring him manacled to the bar, while a crowd of reporters follow and gather on each side, notebook in hand. it appears that the prisoner suddenly ran out of a saloon, drew a revolver and began an indiscriminate shooting. the "reserves" were called out and three policemen now lie dangerously wounded in the hospital. he is held for examination, pending a possible inquest by the coroner.
meantime a lank youth from new jersey listens vacantly while an officer accuses him of abandoning a horse which has suddenly expired while harnessed to the defendant's truck wagon. he pays a fine and vanishes. two young irish-americans, mutually damaged, are arraigned for "disorderly conduct." they, too, are fined, being already substantially punished—by each other. a man accused of "sunday selling" follows a woman who tells a pitiful tale of how her husband has abandoned her and her five little ones. later in the day the husband is found and ordered to pay her ten dollars per week. two retail milk dealers charged with adulteration or "keeping a cow in an unhealthy place," a band of pickpockets who have been caught "working" a horse-car, a woman accused of "soliciting," and a bartender who has allowed a "slot machine" to be left upon the premises, give place to a vociferous store-keeper who has caused the arrest of a very stout man for the lar[pg 55]ceny of four pairs of trousers. he explains loudly that the defendant (who weighs at least 325 pounds) came into the store, asked to see some "pants," and while the clerk was not looking stuffed four pairs of these articles inside his waistband and made his escape. the complainant not only identifies the defendant with absolute certainty but goes so far as to state with equal positiveness that the accused now has on the very trousers into which he stuffed the stolen property. four pairs identical in size and material with those alleged to have been purloined are produced and marked in evidence. the fat man indignantly denies having been in the store at all. the reporters are interested.
"gentlemen," says the judge, "i appoint you a committee to conduct the defendant to my private room for the purpose of determining whether or not you can stuff these articles of apparel inside his waistband."
the reporters, followed more slowly by the perspiring defendant, make their way to a back room, from which they presently emerge to announce through their spokesman that it would be impossible to thrust any object, much less four pairs of trousers, inside the band of the defendant's trousers.
in the interim the judge has been settling matrimonial difficulties, giving all sorts of gratuitous legal advice, acting as arbitrator over the question of the mutual use of the "landings" on the stairs in tenement houses, issuing warrants, and endeavoring to find an opportunity to continue the hearing in a complicated "false label" case. in this last several rather well-known attorneys are retained, who stand[pg 56] about disgustedly while the more immediate business of the court is being attended to. in most cases, however, the lawyers are hardly likely to add to the general reputation of the profession for ability.
the inordinate number of cases which the magistrates have to dispose of results oftentimes in an inconclusive method of hearing charges of misdemeanors or of felonies, which, if the defendant be held at all, must of necessity be tried in a higher court or, as the magistrates say, "go downtown." if the defendant be a man of some influence, with enough money to retain a boisterous and bully-ragging lawyer, the line of least resistance may lead the judge almost unconsciously to regard the case as having "nothing in it." if, on the other hand, the complainant be a man of independence and insistence, with perhaps a bit of a pull, it is much easier to "hold" a defendant than to assume the responsibility of "turning him out." in point of fact some magistrates are prone to shift the responsibility off their own shoulders and to "hold" anyway. thus there can be "no kick coming" so far as they are concerned. there are also cases where, rather than take the time for a careful examination of the case, the magistrate will "hold," when, if he had really examined into it with the necessary care, he would find that there was no reasonable ground for his action. now the grand jury is apt to find an indictment almost as a matter of course, and the defendant must then be placed on trial before a petit jury. in large measure this is the reason why the calendars of the criminal courts are crowded with cases which should never have gone beyond the police court, and why prisoners charged with homicide often lie for months in the tombs before the petty business of[pg 57] the general sessions can be cleaned up sufficiently to allow time for their trial. in this way much of the work which should be done by the police judge is cast upon the already over-burdened petit jury. the evil, however, does not stop there. when a petit jury finds that a majority of the cases brought before it have little or no merit it frequently gets the idea that all criminal business is of the same character and that it is empanelled for the purpose of a general jail delivery. after a jury has "turned out" twenty men in succession it can hardly be blamed for thinking that the twenty-first, who may be a real sinner, ought likewise to be sent home with the others to join his family. respect for law cannot be maintained unless each part of the machine of justice does its full duty and assumes its own burdens and responsibilities.
it goes without saying that no official comes into closer contact with the police than the magistrate. he gets to know them collectively and individually as no other person can. in determining what should be done in any given case he takes largely into consideration the personal equation of the officer making the arrest. he is able to detect exaggerated or manufactured evidence, which might easily pass as truth and perhaps convince a jury in a higher court. hence one of the arguments for giving him a wider original jurisdiction. petit juries are ordinarily disinclined to convict and send a man to state's prison in what seems to them trivial cases. if the magistrate had a wider scope in the disposal of such cases one of the principal reasons for our lack of respect for law (the sentimental and arbitrary action of juries) would be largely done away with.
the magistrate, if he be the right kind of a man,[pg 58] can do more real good, right more real wrongs, and exert a more wholesome and salutary influence upon the working people of large cities than any benevolent or charitable association. he can do much to break up the alliance of the police with crime and to prevent arbitrary acts of violence and lawlessness upon their part committed either to compel the payment of blackmail or cover derelictions of duty.
the police judge also soon learns the character of the practitioners who appear so constantly before him. many a case which on its face seems founded on justice may be shown by a little questioning on the part of the magistrate to be nothing but an attempt to "hold up" or injure the defendant. the quasi-criminal classes know well the power of the criminal law and frequently invite it to secure private vengeance. when two rogues fall out there is often a race to see who can get to the police court first. in other cases the dense ignorance of complainant or defendant renders justice almost impossible. the shyster plays upon this to his profit. there is a story told of a practitioner with a large italian following who was accustomed to display prominently upon a table in his office a small testament and a huge webster's dictionary. after his clients had stated their case he would turn to them and ask:
"do you wish the law from the big book or the little book?"
the clients would inquire the relative cost.
"the law from the little book is ten dollars—the law from the big book is twenty-five dollars."
the clients would consult together and on the assumption that the bigger the book the better the[pg 59] law, would almost invariably pay their twenty-five dollars and procure the best advice which noah webster could give.
the fact that most police magistrates are appointed for purely political reasons is much to be deprecated. the days of bribery are over, but occasionally the public has some excuse for believing that the desire to do "a favor" for a political friend may have influenced the action of one of them. this would have less color were they usually appointed for some other and better reason than mere party fealty. ordinarily the appointment goes to some faithful worker, who has won distinction in ward politics. like enough he may make an excellent judge. at any rate he has a direct personal knowledge of the people with whom he is called to deal. he has equally first-hand information of local conditions and the personnel of the police attached to the neighboring precincts. his judgment is apt to have a practical wisdom that a mere student of law could never achieve. he knows a crooked officer, a crooked lawyer, and a crooked complainant when he sees one. whatever the verbal testimony happens to be he may very well "know different." he is, as the slang phrase accurately puts it, "wise to his job." and when all is said and done the "influence" exerted upon him will probably be only a request to "do the best you can for so and so,—he's a friend of mine," which will not affect his action in the least. a college-bred lawyer with no actual knowledge of existing conditions might have the wool pulled over his eyes at every turn, and, while theoretically enforcing the law as it is printed on the statute books, fail utterly to achieve the rough-and-ready justice[pg 60] which the situation demands and which his less educated brethren can dispense by virtue of instinct acquired from long experience. it must be admitted, however, that the system of political appointments is just as bad, if not worse, when applied to police magistracies as when exercised in higher places. the appointees may or may not turn out successfully, and in new york we have had some extraordinary surprises in both directions.
did space permit a judicious selection of the historic rulings of traditional magistrates would make entertaining reading. one of the most famous was that of a certain learned member of this bench who is said to have discharged a defendant accused of killing a robin in central park in the following words:
"you are charged with breaking a park ordinance forbidding the public to kill the robins. of course you ought not to kill the robins for they are harmless birds, but i have looked this thing up a little, and i find that from time immemorial it has been held that there can be no right of property in wild beasts. now, a robin is clearly ferr? natur?—of a wild nature—and so the city has no property in it. the ordinance is therefore unconstitutional, and i am constrained to discharge you. you may go."
nowhere than on the magistrate's bench is better illustrated the proverb that a little learning is a dangerous thing, but only a little learning, even such as classifies an innocent park robin as a wild beast, is preferable to an openly expressed intention of enforcing only those laws which appeal to the judge's individual sense of propriety. the writer recalls endeavoring some six years ago to induce[pg 61] a certain magistrate to hold a defendant for the grand jury for a certain statutory offence. the learned magistrate positively refused to do so on the ground that there was "no sense in the law."
"but it is the law!" returned the writer.
"well, i don't care if it is," replied the judge tartly. "i didn't make it. it's no law of mine, and i don't propose to follow it. go and get the grand jury to indict if you can, but i won't hold this man for doing what i might want to do myself some day."[21]
taken as a body our magistrates, with a few obvious exceptions, are men of wide experience and practical common sense, who handle the enormous stream of business which comes before them with efficiency and dispatch. a forbidding exterior and, occasionally, a diction which might startle a friday evening prayer meeting may co-exist with a fair mind, a kind heart, and an honest determination to see that justice is done. while the rights of the defendant are fully protected it is probable that actual justice is more nearly accomplished in these than in higher courts, where "reasonable doubt," the presumption of innocence, and kindred privileges, as interpreted by a sympathetic jury, intervene between the rights of the community and those of the prisoner at the bar.
footnotes:
[15] of course if he has been indicted by the grand jury in the first instance, he is arrested on a "bench warrant" issued by a judge of the general sessions and placed in confinement without any preliminary examination.
[16] this condition has been much improved in new york city by the institution of the "night" court in which one magistrate is always on duty. all minor offenders are at once arraigned before him, no matter what the hour, and thus may be disposed of without undue confinement.
[17] "many persons are arrested under suspicious circumstances, such as well-known criminals mysteriously loitering about the streets at night, or frequenting crowded places, or persons having property in their possession for which they can give no good account, nor of themselves. frequently such an arrest is the first step in the detection of some crime in which (after investigation), if the proper complainant is found, a formal complaint is taken, and the prisoner is held for trial. in many instances such an arrest prevents the commission of crime."
comparison with previous years.
number arraigned and discharged.
year. males. females. total.
1896 2335 120 2455
1897 1756 129 1885
1898 1628 154 1782
1899 2033 301 2334
1900 2023 293 2316
1901 2066 197 2263
1902 2337 200 2537
1903 2634 115 2749
1904 3734 224 3958
1905 3551 231 3782
1906 5483 180 5663
1907 2656 118 2774
[18] the nativity of the persons held for trial in 1907 or summarily tried and convicted in magistrates' courts was:
united states 30,261
ireland 8,061
germany 4,219
england 1,044
scotland 473
france 869
italy 8,243
russia 9,254
greece 3,039
other countries 5,790
———
total 71,253
[19] in 1905 the number of persons so held in new york county by the magistrates of the first division, was 36,340.
[20] during 1907 there were arrested 1,669 persons on charges of burglary, of whom 1,055 were held for trial.
[21] see latter half of subdivision 5, section 278 new york penal code.
