"As in Great Expectations,[emphasis mine] an escapee from the hulks would be classed as a "returned convict" and subject to the death penalty", was what Paul wrote, BTNG.

No escapee from the hulks is so subject in Gt Exps {note Paul's intro word "As", please - he might not be 'quoting' from the book, but he is obviously referring directly to [what he takes to be] its plot}. They are, after recapture, then transported; and it is only then, after one of them returns, that he is subject to the death penalty.

The law might or might not have been as you describe in your last post [tho I should be interested to know what your legal/historical qualifications for speaking with such dogmatic apparent authority may be]; but insofar as they refer to Paul's account of what happens in Dickens' novel, they are, at best, only of marginal relevance, if of any at all.

~M~