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Sheriffs, &c. shall not receive any fee for levying or forbearing to levy any sum.
Penalty on sheriff nihiling or neglecting to answer to the crown for any sum actually levied.
Penalty on sheriff, &c. taking any fee or gift on executing or forbearing to execute any green wax process.
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23. No sheriff, under sheriff, bailiff, or other person employed in levying or collecting any of the said debts or sums of money, shall ask or take or receive any fee, gift, gratuity, or reward whatsoever, of the person or persons liable to pay the same, nor of any other person, for or upon pretence of such levying or collecting, or for or upon pretence of forbearing to levy or collect the same, or any part or proportion thereof; and in case any sheriff shall nihil or not duly answer to the crown any debt or sum of money which shall have been levied, collected, or received by him, such sheriff for every such offence shall forfeit treble damages to the party aggrieved, and double the sum nihiled and not duly answered as aforesaid, to his Majesty; which said damages and penalty shall be ordered, decreed, and given by the Court of Exchequer, on complaint and proof of such abuse as aforesaid made and exhibited before the barons of the said court, in such summary way and method as to them shall seem meet; and in case any sheriff, under sheriff, bailiff, or other person so employed as aforesaid, shall demand, take, or receive any sum or sums of money, gift, gratuity, or reward of any kind whatsoever, or any security, promise, or engagement of or for any sum or sums of money, fee, gift, gratuity, or reward of any kind whatsoever, be the same more or less, of any person whomsoever, for or in respect or upon pretence of executing any green wax process of the Court of Exchequer in Ireland, or for or in respect or upon pretence of fees due to them, or any of them, for collecting or receiving the same, or for not executing or for delaying to execute any such process or any warrant issued thereon, or shall accept of a less sum upon account or in payment or discharge of any such process or warrant than as in such warrant or process is mentioned, then and in all and every such case, every person so offending, and being thereof lawfully convicted, shall be deemed guilty of extortion; and every person being thereof lawfully convicted shall forfeit for every such offence to the party aggrieved in such process or warrant the amount of the sum ordered to be levied by such process or warrant, and double the sum so extorted, together with full costs of suit, to be recovered by action of debt, bill, plaint, or information, in any of the superior courts of record in Dublin.
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