Rex v Lakatula and Others

• Jurisdiction: South Africa
• Judge: Solomon ACJ, CG Maasdorp JA and De Villiers AJA
• Judgment Date: 27 June 1919
• Citation: 1919 AD 362
• Hearing Date: 26 June 1919
• Court: Appellate Division

Solomon, A.C.J.:

The accused in this case were convicted of the crime of murder. At the close of the case for the prosecution counsel for the prisoners applied for their discharge on the ground that there was not sufficient evidence for the case to go to the jury, and the learned Judge reserved the point. No evidence was called for the defence, and the jury convicted all the accused. After the conviction on the application of their counsel the Judge under section 372 of the Criminal Procedure Code of 1917 reserved for the consideration of the Court of Appeal the following question: "Whether the Judge at the trial should not have withdrawn the case from the jury on the ground that there was no corroboration of the evidence of Notje who was an accomplice in the crime." The Attorney General has raised the point whether this is strictly a question of law which can be reserved under section 372, and whether the point reserved should not not have been that at the close of the trial there was no legal evidence on which the jury were entitled to convict. I agree with him that if at the close of the case for the prosecution the Judge refuses to withdraw the case from the jury because in his opinion there is evidence which would justify them in convicting, the exercise of

Solomon, A.C.J.

his discretion cannot be called in question, under sec. 372. It may very well be that, even if the Judge is wrong in his view, the deficiency in the evidence for the prosecution may be supplied by the witnesses for the defence, and so a case may be established against the accused. But I do not think that in such an event the Court of Appeal would be entitled to set aside the conviction on the ground that the learned...