Law Dictionary
To search for a particular term please use the following search box.
Click on a category to see available terms for that category.
- Banking Law
- Canon Law
- Civil Law
- Civil Rights
- Commercial Law
- Common Law
- Consumer Law
- Contract Law
- Contracts
- Corporate Law
- Courts
- Criminal Law
- Employment Law
- English Law
- Family Law
- Feudal Law
- French Law
- General Practice
- Government
- Health Law
- Immigration Law
- Insurance Law
- Intellectual Property Law
- International Law
- Investment Law
- Latin Terms
- Maritime Law
- Military Law
- Monarchy
- Obsolete
- Real Estate Law
- Roman Law
- Scottish Law
- Spanish Law
- Tax Law
- Torts
- Transportation Law
- Trusts and Estates
- Water Law
reward
An offer of recompense given by authority of law for the performance of some act for the public good; which, when the act has been performed, is to be paid; or it is the recompense actually paid.
2. A reward may be offered by the government or by a private person. In criminal prosecutions, a person may be a competent witness although he expects, on conviction of the prisoner, to receive a reward. 1 Leach, 314, n 9 Barn. & Cresw. 556;S. C. Eng. C. L. R. 441; 1 Leach, 134; 1 Hayw. Rep. 3 1 Root, R. 249; Stark. Ev. pt. 4, p. 772, 3; Roscoe's Cr. Ev. 104; 1 Chit. Cr. Law, 881; Hawk. B. 2, c. 12, s. 21 to 38; 4 Bl. Com. 294; Burn's Just. Felony, iv. See 6 Humph. 113.
3. By the common law, informers, who are entitled under penal statutes to part of the penalty, are not in general competent witnesses. But when a stat-ute can receive no execution, unless a party interested be a witness, then it seems proper to admit him, for the statute must not be rendered ineffectual for want of proof. Gilb. 114. In many acts of the legislature there is a provision that the informer shall be a witness, notwithstanding the reward. 1 Phil. Ev. 92, 99.
Source : Bouvier 1856
Language : English