LIVELY PASSAGE.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 251, 23 October 1928, Page 7

LIVELY PASSAGE.

WORK OF POLICE

Taking Of Statements Not In

The Law.

PRISONERS " GOT AT."

(Australian Press Assn.—United Service.)

(Received 12.30 p.m.)

LONDON, October 22,

Sir Archibald Bodkin, giving evidence before the Police Commission, took the public behind scenes in several famous murder cases. He mentioned the Yaquieu murder, the Byfleet publican, the Jones and the Gutteridge cases.

Lord Lee (chairman of the Commission) said apparently the police charged Browne and Kennedy with theft when they were really concerned about murder. They had the murder charge up their sleeves but got at Browne and Kennedy by charging them with lesser crimes. Sir Archibald raised his / hand in a gesture of protest and said he could not accept the expression "got at." It was in tho man's own interest to explain the possession of revolvers at the earliest opportunity.

Lord Lee gslcll if it was considered convenient when a man was suspected of a grave crime to charge him with a lesser offence in order to have a better opportunity of questioning him.

Sir Reginald I'oole added: In order to get him under lock and key.

Witness replied: There are cases when the police suspect a man, but if the police find he has committed another crime it" is their duty to arrest him. He can then be questioned regarding the other matter under lock and key. He added: "I think this is first rate procedure from the public viewpoint."

He emphatically denied the existence of the third degree, declaring judges had never once sustained sucb a plea.

Lord Lee remarked that it was one person's word against another's.

Sir Archibald Bodkin replied: It is the Court's business to discover credibility.

Sir Reginald Poole suggested that a policeman's good character helped him against the prisoner.

Witness: Put bluntly, that's perjury

Sir Reginald Poole: The safeguards do not prove the policeman does not commit perjury.

Sir Archibald Bodkin expressed the opinion that it Was unlikely an officer would deceive a judge, counsel or a jury.

Sir Reginald Poole asked under what statute were people detained.

Witness: There is no statute. It is practice and common sense.

Commissioner Pick: It is illegal. Sir Archibald Bodkin: It is not illegal.

Sir Reginald Poole: It is not sanctioned by statute.

Witness: A great many things in our law do not have the sanction of statute Land a. good thing too. He expressed the .opinion that the police were fully I competent to interpret the true sense [of people's statements.

Lord Lee said Sir Archibald was inclined to attribute superhuman powers to policemen. Few people were able to interpret the human mind.-