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3. Forgery of copies of Public Acts by Public Officer or servant
3. Forgery of copies of Public Acts by Public Officer or servant
The punishment of hard labour for a term from thirteen months to two years, with or without solitary confinement, is provided against any public officer or servant who:
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(a) gives out any writing in a legal form representing it to "be a copy of a public act when such act does not exist; or
(b) gives out a legal and authentic copy in virtue of his office, in a manner contrary to or different from the original, without this being altered or suppressed.
In the latter case where the copy is so given out by the mere negligence of the public officer or servant, the punishment is a fine (multa) (Sections 189, 190).
These provisions do not require any special explanation. The ingredients of the crime are clear from the provisions themselves.
A copy is “legal” or “in legal and authentic form" when it is accompanied by such formalities and declarations as are prescribed by law, when it is given and accepted as the work of the public officer, and when, therefore, it is received as such in judicial proceedings and administrative uses. Section 636 of the Code of Organisation and Civil Procedure (applied to criminal proceedings by Section 513(i)(c) of the Criminal Code) lays down that "authentic copies are admissible as evidence to the same extent as the originals. Copies are deemed to be authentic, when they are made in the form prescribed by law by the officer by whom the original was received or is preserved, or by the person lawfully authorised for the purpose” .
Where the offence consists in giving out the copy in a manner different from the original, it is necessary, according to the authorities, that the difference shall be in some material particular. Canofari, commenting on the corresponding provision of the Neapolitan Code on which the above provisions of our Code were formed, wrote:
“Una diversità interamente oziosa, nulla, incapace a produrre alcun effetto, non e' il soggetto di questo articolo” (art. 289).
But it must be again made clear that this is so not because of any assumed impossibility of causing actual injury to the prejudice of others but because there
