BUTLER LLOYD, Ag.C.J., NIGERIA, BAKER AND MARTINDALE, JJ.
This is a case stated by Mr. Justice Brooke for the opinion of this Court. The question upon which the opinion is sought is
“Whether the Court came to a correct decision in holding on the facts that a threat to arrest another with a show of authority to which that other submits is an imprisonment even though the plaintiff stated in his evidence that he did not think he would be arrested.”
Now the learned Judge when stating the said case specified that the Court held that “it had been established that first defendant had detained plaintiff at Minna” for a period of some six months.
It seems to us that this finding, with which we entirely agree, disposes in effect of the whole issue in the case which was, “did plaintiff remain in Minna by reason of the threats which had been made to him or of his own free will?”
What constitutes imprisonment has been long ago defined. It is to be found in a work of very good authority in the application of the common law Termes de la Ley m these words: “Imprisonment is no other thing but the restraint of a man's liberty whether it be in the open field or in the stocks or in the cage in the streets” (referring to now obsolete methods of imprisonment) “or in a man's own house as well as in the common gaol and in all the places, the party so restrained is said to be a prisoner so long as he hath not his liberty freely to go at all times to all places whither he will.”
The learned Judge has found that plaintiff was detained by first defendant. We are bound by that finding and plaintiff is entitled to succeed.