Police Deny Bus Was Harassed

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32252, 21 March 1970, Page 12

Police Deny Bus Was Harassed

(N.Z. Press Association) |; WELLINGTON, March 20. 1 Claims of police'] harassment of a bus;< bringing Progressive,' Youth Movement demonstrators from Auckland h to Wellington—and ah denial that any harass-! 1 ment occurred—are con- ] tained in a statement i issued today by the’ Assistant Commissioner ] of Police (Mr W. H. A. , Sharp). I

I Mr Sharp’s statement follows claims by the driver of the bus, Mr W. M. Nash, that police cars closely followed the bus and that a police officer at central police station refused to take down a com- | plaint. The bus was bringing demonstrators to Wellington for the opening of Parliament by the Queen. Regarding the “tailing” of the bus from Auckland to Wellington, Mr Sharp said: “No instructions were issued to police that the bus and its passengers were to be kept under continuous observation, and this was not done. “Members of the police in districts through which the bus would pass were simply

asked to report any sightings so that a time of arrival in Wellington could be established and, except in Welling;ton, any police who followed the bus did so in the course of normal patrols. “In fact, the only times police patrols did follow the I bus were for a short distance lin Auckland and for about a mile in the vicinity of Hamj ilton.” Mr Sharp said that if—as Mr Nash claimed —a police car followed the bus in the vicinity of Ngaruawahia, the driver of the car did not know what bus it was, or what passengers it carried. “In the vicinity of the! Ngauranga Gorge, two police; icars were awaiting the arrival iof the bus, and I make no secret of the fact. These cars I kept well back after the occupants of the bus started to photograph the police car and its occupants.” Mr Sharp said that at the Wellington police station Mr Nash and the organiser of the Wellington branch of the Drivers’ Union (Mr P. Kelly) had walked into an office the door of which was marked “Authorised Persons Only” and, when asked to go to the watchhouse with their complaints, had not done so. The general manager of North Shore Transport, Ltd (Mr K. Nilsson), said today that Mr Nash—an employee of the company—hired the bus. , “He hired the bus and he has the right to drive it himself for a private party,” he said. , . Mr Nilsson said that quite a number of the company’s drivers hire buses and drive them, especially those belonging to sports organisations. The Press Association reported from Auckland that Mrs Nash received three threatening telephone calls tonight. Mr Nash was due back from Wellington about midnight. One telephone caller implied that the Nash home at Devonport might be blown up. The calls were made in a short space of time. Police were keeping a watch over the house tonight.