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Coroners - From: 1800 To: 1849
This page lists 1 cases, and was prepared on 20 May 2019.
Garnett v Ferrand And Another [1827] EngR 492; (1827) 6 B and C 611; (1827) 108 ER 576
28 May 1827
Lord Tenterden CJ
Coroners, Torts - Other
No action will lie against the Judge of a Court of Record for an act done by him in his judicial capacity, and therefore trespass cannot be maintained against a coroner for turning a person out of a room where he is about to take an inquisition.
Lord Tenterden CJ said: "This freedom from action and question of the suit of an individual is given by the law to the Judges, not so much for their own sake as for the sake of the public, and for the advancement of justice, that being free from actions, they may be free in thought and independence in judgment, as all who are to administer justice ought to be."
"There is not any occasion to inquire into the power of the coroner before Magna Charta, for by c 17 his power to hold pleas of the Crown was taken away. 'No sheriff, constable, escheator, coroner, nor any other our bailiffs, shall hold pleas of our Crown.' Upon this, Lord Coke says, 'And what authority had the coroner? The same authority he now hath, in case when any man come to violent or untimely death, super visum corporis, &e., abjurations and outlawries, &e., appeals of death by bill, &e. This authority of the coroner, viz. the coroner solely to take an indictment super visum corporis, and to take an appeal, and to enter the appeal ; and the count remaineth to this day. But he can proceed no further, either upon the indictment or appeal, but to deliver them over to the justices: and this is saved to them by Stat. Westm. 1, c. 10.'It may, however, be said, that as to some matters arising out of this inquiry, the inquest of the coroner is final, ex. gr., that the deceased was felo de se ; that a certain thing was deodand; that a certain person was guilty, and fled for it. There are one or two dicta in the books that these findings are not traversable. But it appears by the best authorities, that the inquests of the coroner are in no case conclusive, and that any one affected by them, either collaterally or otherwise, may deny their authority, and put them in issue ."
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