- Richard Norton (justice)
His Worship Richard Norton KS JP (d. 1420) was a British justice. He was the son of Adam Conyers, who changed his name to Adam Norton when he married the heiress ofNorton-on-Derwent inYorkshire . Norton is first mentioned as anAdvocate in 1399, and was created aSerjeant-at-law in 1401. On 4 June 1405 he was appointed to the trial of those involved inRichard le Scrope 's rebellion, but was removed from the commission on 6 June. He served in 1406 as an Assize justice for thePalatinate ofDurham , and in the same year was made aKing's Serjeant . He was appointed as a justice for theCourt of Common Pleas by Henry V on 23 May 1413, and Chief Justice a month later on 26 of June, becoming Chief justice of the Palatinate ofLancaster at around the same time. Between November 1414 and December 1420 he also appeared as a regular Trier of Petitions in Parliament.Norton served on many government commissions under Henry IV and Henry V, most notably as a commissioner of
Oyer and terminer inDurham ,Yorkshire ,Norfolk ,Suffolk andDevon , and as an officer tasked with hunting down escaped criminals inNorthumberland , Yorkshire, Norfolk and Suffolk. After his investigation into Richard le Scrope he was tasked with a similar commission into the lands of Henry Percy in 1407. He also served as a justice of the peace from 1399 onwards, initially for theNorth Riding of Yorkshire but later for other areas. He died on 20 December 1420, and was buried in Wath, Yorkshire. [cite web|url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/20352?&docPos=35&backToResults=list=yes|group=yes|feature=yes|aor=3|orderField=alpha|title=Oxford DNB article: Norton, Richard|last=Kingsford|first=C.L|coauthors=Keith Dockray |date=2004|publisher=Oxford University Press|accessdate=2008-10-01]References
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