Socius criminis no objection to a witness in the crime of forgery.
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The Royal Bank discovered a forgery of their notes, wherein three persons were concerned, John Young, serjeant in Colonel Rich's regiment, an Irishman, who employed the other two; one of them, Parker, an Englishman, a centinel in the same regiment, formerly a schoolmaster, the greatest master of the pen that has been known, and who wrote the notes and subscriptions so dextrously, that the cashier and accountant, when upon oath, owned they could not have denied the subscriptions to be theirs, but for the paper they were wrote on, which wanted the white letters in the paper put in at the mitt; the third, David Gray, a Scots man, who made the stamp for the King's face. The man most dangerous was Parker: But as he was the person who was prevailed upon to make the discovery, it became necessary to attack Young; and in the trial which was in this cause, as usual, per modum simfilicis querelæ, the objection made for the pannel to Parker, when adduced as a witness, That he was socius criminis, was repelled; an objection never sustained in crimine falsi. But when his examination was over, the pannel was allowed to put the question, Whether he had been promised a pardon? as what might affect his credibility with the jury, and to which he deponed negativé.
