CHAPTER
89
VAGRANCY |
ARRANGEMENT OF
SECTIONS |
SECTION |
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SCHEDULES. |
FIRST SCHEDULE - Vagrants. |
SECOND SCHEDULE - Rogues and Vagabonds. |
THIRD SCHEDULE - Incorrigible Rogues. |
CHAPTER 89 |
VAGRANCY |
An Act to
control vagrants and for purposes related thereto. | 22 of 1939
43 of 1964
18 of 1965
66 of 1965
5 of 1987 |
[Commencement 27th
February, 1939] |
1. This Act may be cited as the Vagrancy Act. | Short title. |
2. (1) In this Act the expression "the
magistrate" shall include every person exercising the judicial powers of a
magistrate under the provisions of the Magistrates Act. | Interpretation. |
(2) In this Act
"public place" means any cartway, court, field, footway, highway,
pathway, passage, passageway, wharf, place of public resort, road and streets. |
3. Any person who commits any of the offences specified
in the First Schedule to this Act and who is
convicted by the magistrate of any such offence shall be deemed a vagrant and
shall be liable to a fine of twenty dollars or to imprisonment for two months. | Vagrants. |
4. Any person who commits any of the offences specified
in the Second Schedule to this Act and
who is convicted by the magistrate of any such offence shall be deemed a rogue
and vagabond and be liable to a fine of fifty dollars or to imprisonment for
four months. | Rogues and vagabonds. |
5. Any person who commits any of the offences specified
in the
Third Schedule to this Act and who is convicted of any such offence by the
magistrate shall be deemed an incorrigible rogue and be liable to imprisonment
for one year. | Incorrigible rogue. |
6. (1) It shall be lawful for a peace officer to arrest
without warrant any person who shall be found offending against this Act. | Arrest. |
(2) Any person so
arrested shall forthwith be brought before the magistrate for trial. |
7. The provisions of this Act shall be in addition to
and not in derogation of the provisions of the Penal Code or any other Act: | Saving. |
Provided however
that no person shall in respect of the same offence be punished under this Act
and also under the Penal Code or any other Act. |
8. This Act shall apply throughout The Bahamas. | Application. |
SCHEDULES |
FIRST SCHEDULE (Section 3) |
VAGRANTS |
1.
Being a person who, being able to work or by other lawful means to maintain
himself or his family whom he or she may be legally bound to maintain, such
person or family being without other means of support, refusing or neglecting
so to do. |
2. Being a common prostitute, loitering or soliciting in a street or public
place for the purpose of prostitution. |
3. Being a person
wandering abroad or placing himself in any public place to beg or gather alms
or cause or procure or encourageany child or young
person, within the meaning of the Children and Young Persons Act,
so to do. |
4. Being a person
who pretends or professes to tell fortunes. |
5.
Being a person who plays or bets (otherwise than in accordance with the
provisions of any law for the time being in force permitting gaming) in any
public place at any game or pretended game of chance or with any instrument of
gaming. |
SECOND SCHEDULE (Section 4) |
ROGUES AND
VAGABONDS |
1. Being a person
committing any of the offences mentioned in section 3 of this Act after having
been deemed a vagrant. |
2. Being a person
lying, sleeping, or loitering in, upon or under any verandah, gallery, barn,
out-house, passageway, cartway, or building wholly or in part unoccupied, and
not being able to give a satisfactory account of himself. |
3. Being a person
found in or under any cart, carriage, vessel, aircraft or on or under any
wharf, jetty, bridge, footway or any public place not being able to give a
satisfactory account of himself or who refuses to leave or move therefrom when
requested so to do by any peace officer or by any person in charge of such
wharf, jetty, bridge or footway or public place or such car, carriage, vessel
or aircraft. |
4. Being a person
found in, upon or under any dwelling house, warehouse, coach house, stable,
garage or out-house or in any enclosed yard or garden and not being able to
give a satisfactory account of himself or who is found there for the purpose of
committing some offence, either in that place or at some other place. |
5. Being a
suspected person or reputed thief frequenting or loitering in or about any
place, public or private, with intent to commit an offence: |
Provided that in
proving the intent to commit an offence as referred to in paragraphs 4 and 5 of
this Schedule it shall not be necessary to prove that the person suspected was
guilty of any particular act or acts tending to show his purpose or intent and
he may be convicted if from the circumstances of the case and from his known
character as proved to the court it appears to the court that his intent was to
commit an offence. |
6. Being a person
exposing to view in any public place any obscene print, picture or other
indecent exhibition. |
7. Being a person
wilfully, openly, lewdly or obscenely exposing his person in any street, road
or public highway or in view thereof or in any place of public resort or with
intent to insult any female. |
8. Being a person
wandering abroad and endeavouring by the exposure of wounds or deformities to
obtain or gather alms. |
9. Being a person
procuring or endeavouring to procure a charitable contribution of any nature or
kind under false or fraudulent pretence. |
THIRD SCHEDULE (Section 5) |
INCORRIGIBLE
ROGUES |
1. Being a person
committing any of the offences mentioned in section 4 of this Act after having
been deemed a rogue and vagabond. |
2. Being a person
having in his control or possession any picklock, key, jackbit, and other
implements with intent to commit an indictable offence. |
3. Being a person
armed with any gun, pistol, hanger, cutlass, bludgeon or other offensive weapon
or any instrument with intent to commit any felonious act. |
4. Being a person
apprehended as a vagrant or rogue and vagabond and violently resisting any
peace officer so apprehending him and being subsequently convicted of the
offence for which he shall have been so apprehended. |