Acts 16:22

‘And the multitude rose up together against them, and the magistrates tore their clothes off them, and commanded to beat them with rods.'

These men clearly took pains to incite the crowds in the market place, who responded to the charge and expressed their disapproval of ‘these Jews'. The danger of an uproar probably persuaded the magistrates to act. They therefore had them stripped and beaten with rods. This would be done by the ‘lictors' (a kind of police who were the magistrates' assistants). It was a high-handed treatment quite regularly meted out to ordinary people ‘in trouble with the law' whether they were innocent or not. It was looked on with careless unconcern as a salutary reminder to them that they must treat the law, together with the courts and their deliberations, seriously. It would also help to settle the crowds. Justice could be sorted out later. Roman citizens were in fact exempt from it, but no one would listen to any protests while tempers were so enflamed (Cicero gives an account of a similar case of a Roman citizen who was beaten while all ignored his claims).

Roman justice was undoubtedly better than most other systems, (that was why they were eventually released), but it still left a lot to be desired.