STOP AND Search PDF

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Summary

Stop and Search Stop and search powers  Origins in the ‘sus’ laws (s & s Vagrancy Act 1824): allows constable to arrest someone who is loitering with intent to commit a crime, evidence for that offence of suspicious behaviour was the eyewitness of the other police officer - used extensively...

Description

Stop and Search 1. Stop and search powers  Origins in the ‘sus’ laws (s.4 & s.6 Vagrancy Act 1824): allows constable to arrest someone who is loitering with intent to commit a crime, evidence for that offence of suspicious behaviour was the eyewitness of the other police officer used extensively until 1980s 

Sus repealed and replaced by the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) S1(1) PACE allows police to stop and search someone on the street, pockets, bags, vehicle where they suspect the person is committing/has committed/proceeds of crime on them without having to arrest them

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A power – short of arrest – to allow a police officer to confirm or allay suspicion of wrongdoing different from sus, where sus involves an arrest this is a short detention

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Stop and search mission creep An intrusive and coercive power

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Intrusive and coercive power? Gillan v MPC: detention for the purposes of a search that lasted 20 minutes, involved a “temporary restriction of movement and not anything which could sensibly be called a deprivation of liberty” […] “in the absence of special circumstances, such a person should not be regarded as being detained in the sense of confined or kept in custody, but more properly of being detained in the sense of kept from proceeding or kept waiting. There is no deprivation of liberty if asked to stop by police and told that he will be searched, A cannot go to wherever he wants to go, otherwise he will be arrested seems that there is use of coercive power and there is deprivation of liberty there can scarcely be any meaning to the word “stop” if it does not indicate an attempt to detain someone from continuing his or her free passage on foot or in a vehicle s8 Criminal Justice & Public Order Act 1994 ‘ A person who fails to stop or (as the case may be) to stop the vehicle when required to do so by a constable in the exercise of his powers under this section shall be liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding one month or to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale or both if A doesn’t stop he commits an arrestable offence is SS a deprivation of liberty? ECtHR held that it was an interference with private life it is an intrusion of privacy but moot point on whether it is deprivation of liberty

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Justification of stop & search powers Stop and search as an investigative power s.1 PACE (1984) S.43 Terrorism Act obligation on police to find out what happened act as deterrent

Stop and search as a deterrent power? s. 60 Criminal justice and Public Order Act (1994) s. 44 (s.47A) Terrorism Act 2000 by stop and search, it creates a deterrent effect no need to have grounds of suspicions as long as there is anticipation of violence to prevent hooliganism, deter people to carry such weapons

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Statistics 1.2m people searched under PACE every year 150k under S60 What would make D suspicious? Based on stereotypes, prejudice Appearance: gender/ethnicity/wearing hoodies/with their friends Behaviour? drinking loud agitated Place: depends on crime neighbourhood Time Age: young people Crime committed by someone fitting your description Case study: Daniel Kaluuya What is reasonable suspicion? reasonable suspicion can never be supported on the basis of personal factors alone without supporting intelligence or information. For example, a person's colour, age, hairstyle or manner of dress, or the fact that he is known to have a previous conviction for possession of an unlawful article, cannot be used alone or in combination with each as the sole basis on which to search that person. Nor may it be founded on the basis of stereotyped images of certain persons or groups as more likely to be committing offences need an objective basis (supporting intelligence or information) 4/5 people are innocent when they were stopped and searched There is a balance between crime control and due process

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If the goal is to deter people cannabis, why arrest people? Just stop and search people as many as possible When is suspicion reasonable? Basis of suspicion Objective evidence Witness description? Hunches? Usual suspects? Generalisations? Hit rate (percentage of stops resulting in an arrest):...