Messrs. Terry and Burch, respectively manager and secretary of the
late Unity Bank, were acquitted on Thursday of the charge of having unlawfully conspired to publish a false balance-sheet of the affairs of that bank. Mr. Justice Smith, in summing up, told the jury that they must be satisfied that the prisoners had con- spired, that the balance-sheet was false, and that the intention had been to defraud. He considered the mode of making out the balance-sheet most improper and vicious, but as the same mode had been adopted by the former manager, the jury would have to decide whether the issue of the balance-sheet in question was the act of Mr. Terry or part of an established system. He could not see how the manager could be said to be acting criminally when the account he made was in reality that of the directors. As to Mr. Burch, he was clearly only a subordinate, bound to obey the orders of the manager. The jury followed the ruling of the judge, and acquitted the prisoners of conspiracy, but embodied in their verdict the opinion he had expressed as to the mode in which the balance-sheet had been made out, and censured the negligen,ce of the directors in their supervision of the accounts. The verdict seems the only one to which they could come, as it was clear that the directors alone were responsible for the pre- paration of the balance-sheet, and the auditors for its issue.
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