Ready v. Commonwealth

The Chief Justice

delivered the Opinion of the Court.

This writ of error is brought to reverse a judgment on a scire facias, issued on a recognizance, acknowledged by Ready, as the owner of a slave named Cato, before two Justices of the peace who had committed Cato to prison, on a charge of having feloniously caused the death of another slave, by striking him with a deadly weapon, with the intention of killing him.

The recognizance was acknowledged some days after the commitment, and was intended for securing the appearance of Cato in the Circuit Court, to answer that said charge of felony. He…