Sila muat turun buku yang turut merujuk adakah Tunku Muhammad Saad ialah "Lanun" atau "Pejuang" dengan klik di ikon buku di bawah ekstrak teks ini:
Ekstrak daripada muka surat 226 dari buku The Law of Piracy, 1988 karangan Alfred. P. Rubin.
Norris cited R. v. Kidd for the proposition that even if Mohamed Saad had a commission from the rightful Sultan of Kedah, he might have exceeded it and thus become a "pirate." In general, Norris took a "naturalist" position, asserting British jurisdiction to exist over foreigners for their depredations on the high seas against yet other foreigners. 140 The case was then tried before a jury with the defense alleging that as subjects of the "King of Quedah" they "are not British subjects, neither are they are [sic] of the description of other persons who, by the Laws of Englandrespecting the offences of Piracy, are made amenable to the said Laws" by virtue of their official connection with the Ruler of Kedah. 141 Moreover, by virtue of that connection they claimed the right:to pursue any hostile measures of retaliation against Subjects of Great Britain and Siam, that were consistent with the received Laws of Nations by States at war with each other.By which acts of retaliation, such as are charged . . . , the said defendants . . . might have rendered themselves liable to the Laws of War, but not to the Criminal Laws of England. 142 Norris charged the jury that the law of nations applied to the case, apparently meaning "international law" or the law between states rather than the private law identical in all states, and not the law ofEngland. He held that uncontradicted evidence made it clear that the defendants acted for public purposes on behalf of the Sultan of Kedah at all important times. He argued as a matter of law that dynastic struggles such as that of James II after 1688 and in Scotland for forty years after the Act of Union of 1707144 could not be deemed by international law to involve acts of "piracy " whatever the labels used by one or other of the parties to the struggle. 145 The prisoners were released except for Mohamed Saad himself, who was held as a political prisoner in "honourable captivity" at the will of the Crown.
