THAT EVERY MAN should be deemed innoc'e rl until he is
proved guilty is a noble tradition; buo there are times when it may involve a man wh actually is innocent in difficulty and embarois: ment. There is a clear distinction between a .man the police know has not committed a crime but who they believe may possess (per- haps unwittingly) evidence about the criminal, (b) a man the police suspect may have committed a crime, and (c) a man against whom the police have a cast-iron case even before he is caught. But whichever of these categories X may be in, he tends automatically to be described at the moment as a man 'whom the police believe may be able to help them in their inquiries.' Now, it Is true that this saves the police from the possible embarrassment, and the newspapers from the Possible libel actions, which they might suffer if, say, a man named as a suspect turned out to be innocent. But it also means that a man who is Innocent, and who is wanted only for the infor- mation he may have about the real criminal, is automatically suspected by the newspaper-read- ing (and television-watching—and radio-listening, for that matter) public, as soon as his name is Published, of being the criminal. This has hap- Pened on a number of occasions recently. Of course, it may be said that if a distinction in Wording were to be made by the police, the man Who really was suspected of a crime would suffer an even graver handicap when he came to be tried. But the alternative to trial by newspaper seems to be, at the moment, condemnation with- out trial. Something seems to have gone wrong with the system.
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