Justin Perera V. Ratnayake

1957 Present : T. S. Fernando, J.

JUSTIN PERERA and others, Appellants, and P. B. RATNAYAKE
(Inspector of Police), Respondent

S. C.1,123-1,135-M. C. Colombo South, 75,832

    Wrongful restraint-ingredients of offence-Must obstruction be to a person only?-Obstruction of vehicle while it is being driven-Culpability-Penal Code, s. 330.

Obstruction of a vehicle when it is being driven by a man can amount to wrongful restraint of that man within the meaning of section 330 of the Penal Code. In such a case the fact that the man is allowed to go unmolested provided that he does not attempt to take the vehicle with him is immaterial.

APPEAL from a judgment of the Magjstrate's Court, Colombo South.

M. M. Kumarakulasingham, with D. R. P. Goonetilleke, for the accused- appellants.

K. V. S. Shanmuganathan, Crown Counsel, for the Attorney-General.

Cur. adv. vult.

March 14,1957. T. S. FERNANDO, J.-

The appellants (thirteen of them) were convicted in the Magistrate's Court on two charges. The first charge alleged that they were members of an unlawful assembly, the common object of which was wrongfully to restrain one Albert Silva from proceeding from the premises of a garage of a bus company driving a bus of that company on to the main road outside the garage. The second charge alleged that in prosecution of the said common object they committed the offence of wrongfully restraining Albert Silva in the manner alleged in the unlawful assembly charge.

The facts alleged in the evidence led by the prosecution were not disputed by the defence. The appellants were on the day in question either employees, ex-employees or sympathisers of the employees of the bus company referred to above. It would appear that, without any previous warning to the company, most of its employees had struck work and had assembled early morning outside the gate of the garage premises. It is quite unnecessary for the purpose of this appeal to go into the causes which led to the strike. The management of the bus company, being thus deprived of the services of most of their drivers and conductors, had requested Albert Silva, one of their employees who had not joined the strike, to drive bus No. IC 1510, one of its buses, out of the garage

and on to the road preparatory to commencing their daily passenger service. This was the first of the buses lined up for transport of passengers that day, and the evidence shows that there were about thirteen other buses behind it manned by non-strikers and ready to be driven off. It is not contested by the defence that driving off became impossible as a result of the appellants, and possibly a few others who have no been charged in this case, jumping in front of the leading bus IC 1510 as it emerged out of the gate on to the space outside and before it could reach the tarred portion of the road. Having jumped forward, the appellants and the others either sat down or reclined on the ground in front of this bu8, and some of the appellants declared or announced that Albert Silva would not be permitted to get on to the road driving that bus and they even challenged him to attempt to drive off by running over them. The obstruction thus offered to Albert Silva driving off was admitted in an unusually candid statement made in the witness-box by the 12th accused appellant who testified that the object of the appellants was to present the buses of the company concerned leaving the garage on the day in question and that it was their intention not to allow a single bus to leave the premises. Albert Silva was held up in this way from about 5.15 a.m. till 2.45 p.m. when police officers arrested the appellants and led them away to the police station, incidentally removing the obstru1:Jtion to the passage of the buse8 of this bus company.

The only point raised against the conviction is one of law and is formulated in the manner set out below. It is urged that, a