Detective Guilty Of Assault

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31027, 5 April 1966, Page 11

Detective Guilty Of Assault

(N.Z. Press Association? AUCKLAND, April 4. A detective was convicted on a charge of assault and fined £lO by Mr R. M. Grant, S.M. The accused, Trevor Thomas Patrick Martin, aged 36, detective constable, pleaded not guilty to assaulting Graham Hunter, an architectural student, at Papatoetoe on February 19. Inspector K. O. Thompson

prosecuted for the police and Martin was represented by Mr D. B. Pain. Hunter said he had gone to the Stateside coffee lounge, Papatoetoe, after 7 p.m. on February 19. He met Martin coming out of the lounge and asked him about a pair of trousers that Martin had taken from him for scientific tests in connexion with a recent burglary of the lounge. Martin told him he had found glass from the coffee lounge in the trouser pockets. “I told him he must be lying and he slapped me across the face. I punched him back and a brawl started,” said Hunter. Hunter said a man separated them, and he walked across the road, but Martin and the other man caught up with him. “Detective Martin caught me by my shoulders and we fought again. My arms were then pinned to my sides and Detective Martin kept on punching me until I went unconscious.” Hunter said when he came to Martin had told him he was under arrest. “I asked him to state the charge in front of witnesses and he said he wasn’t in the habit of repeating himself,” said Hunter. Hunter said two constables

arrived and Martin told them to arrest him, but they allowed him to go.

Martin said in evidence he had been in the Police Force for nine years and a half, two years and a half of them in the Criminal Investigation Branch.

On the night of February 19 he was in the company of Lindsay Noel Norton. Martin said he had been engaged on an inquiry into the burglary of the Stateside coffee lounge. He wanted to inform the manager of the progress in the inquiry. He was approached outside the lounge by Hunter who asked him whether he was going to be arrested or not. “I told him an arrest would be made at the conclusion of the inquiry,” said Martin. Martin said Hunter had asked him for his trousers back and he had told Hunter that a piece of glass from the lounge had been found in the pocket of the trousers. Martin said Hunter called him “a bloody liar” and struck him in the eye. Martin said he had then slapped Hunter’s face to bring him to his senses. The Magistrate said he was satisfied that after Hunter had called Martin a liar, Martin had slapped his face.

“I deem this matter as an unseemly piece of conduct, particularly the brawl that followed, and I am satisfied that the incident was started by Martin in first striking Hunter.

“It’s an appalling state of affairs for a police constable to so lose his temper that he struck a man,” said the Magistrate.