Odger's English Common Law

PRINCIPALS AND ACCESSORIES. 135
B.'s presence to their child, who ate it and died. A. is not accessory before
the fact to the murder of the child. 1
The same rule applies to principals acting in concert. Thus, where A.
and B. went out to commit theft, and A., unknown to B., took a pistol in
his pocket and shot a man with it, B. is not responsible for this murder.
Three soldiers went out to rob an orchard together. Two of them
climbed up into an apple tree, whilst the third kept watch with a drawn
sword, and killed the owner of the orchard, when he tried to arrest him.
The soldiers in the tree are neither principals nor accessories to the murder
of the owner, unless all three came with a common determination to overcome
all opposition by force. 2
Any one who unlawfully receives, relieves, comforts, assists,
harbours or maintains a felon, knowing that he is a felon, is
an accessory after the fact to the felony that he committed. 3
He or she is guilty of felony and liable to two years' imprison-
ment, with or without hard labour. There is an exception
in the case of a married woman :
a wife may lawfully receive,
comfort and assist her husband, although she knows he is a
felon. An accessory after the fact to murder may be sen-
tenced to penal servitude for life. 4
It is only in cases of felony that there are accessories. In
treason all who are in any way concerned in the treason are
deemed principal traitors. In misdemeanours all who command,
counsel or procure the commission of a misdemeanour
are also principals, and should be indicted as such. But it
is no crime merely to receive, relieve, assist, harbour or main-
tain a misdemeanant, knowing him to have committed a mis-
demeanour ;
5 though any attempt at prison breach or rescue
or any obstruction to an officer in the execution of his duty
would be a misdemeanour in itself. 6
1 R. v. Saunders and Archer (1573), Plowd. 473 ; Foster's Crown Cases, 371.
2 Plummer'i Case (1701), Foster, 352 ; Kelyng, 109.
3 R. v. Levy, [1912] 1 K. B. 158.
* See indictment, No. 21, io the Appendix.
« R. v. Bubb (1906), 70 J. P. 143.
6 See post, pp. 204, 205.