The Criminal Jurisdiction Act 1802 (42 Geo 3 c 85) was an Act of the

Parliament of the United Kingdom The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprema ...

. In the wake of the attempted

impeachment of Warren Hastings The impeachment of Warren Hastings, the first governor-general of Bengal, was attempted between 1787 and 1795 in the Parliament of Great Britain. Hastings was accused of misconduct during his time in Calcutta, particularly relating to mismanageme ...

, it legislated for the

Court of King's Bench The King's Bench (), or, during the reign of a female monarch, the Queen's Bench ('), refers to several contemporary and historical courts in some Commonwealth jurisdictions. * Court of King's Bench (England), a historic court court of common ...

to try and punish past, present and future offences by colonial officials and military officers as if they had been committed in

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, historic county in South East England, southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the Ceremonial counties of ...

Westminster Westminster is an area of Central London, part of the wider City of Westminster. The area, which extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street, has many visitor attractions and historic landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Bu ...

or any county where the offender resided (Sections 1 and 6). It also enabled that court to obtain evidence from governors, local courts and others in the area where the offence occurred by

writ of mandamus (; ) is a judicial remedy in the form of an order from a court to any government, subordinate court, corporation, or public authority, to do (or forbear from doing) some specific act which that body is obliged under law to do (or refrain from ...

(Section 2) and made other provisions for the gathering of that evidence (Sections 3–4) as well as applying the usual perjury laws (Section 5). The Act thus applied more widely the provisions of the

Governors of Plantations Act 1698 The Governors of Plantations Act 1698 ( 11 Will. 3. c. 12) or "An Act to punish Governors of Plantations in this Kingdom for crimes by them committed in the Plantations" was an English Act of Parliament passed in the reign of William III of Englan ...

and the

East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and Southea ...

Acts of 1772 and

1784 Events January–March * January 6 – Treaty of Constantinople: The Ottoman Empire agrees to Russia's annexation of the Crimea. * January 14 – The Congress of the United States ratifies the Treaty of Paris with Great Brit ...

{{cite book, title=A Collection Of Statutes Relating To India Vol.1, year=1899, url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.24167/page/n117/mode/2up, last1=Britain, first1=Great, publisher=Office Of The Superintendent Of Government Printing, Calcutta and was later extended to offences under the

Official Secrets Act 1889 The Official Secrets Act 1889 (52 & 53 Vict. c. 52) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It created offences of disclosure of information (section 1) and breach of official trust (section 2). It was replaced in the UK by the Offi ...

. Part of Sections 2 to 6 of the Act were repealed as to the UK by Section 2 of Public Works Loans Act 1892, words from Section 1 by the

Criminal Justice Act 1948 The Criminal Justice Act 1948 () is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Overview It is "one of the most important measures relating to the reform of the criminal law and its administration". It abolished: * penal servitude, har ...

and Sections 2 to 6 in their entirety by the

Statute Law Revision Act 1964 The Statute Law Revision Act 1964 (c 79) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. This Act was repealed by section 1 of, and Part XI of the Schedule to, the Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1974. The enactments which were repealed (wheth ...

– there are no remaining outstanding effects from the Act.

References

United Kingdom Acts of Parliament 1802 Legislation in British India British East India Company 1802 in India Governance of the British Empire High Court of Justice