Jury awards $7000 but case continues

Press, 18 April 1986, Page 8

Jury awards $7000 but case continues

PA Wellington Damages of $7OOO were awarded by a jury in the High Court at Wellington to a man who claimed he had been wrongfully arrested and imprisoned by a traffic officer. The damages may not have to be paid. Robert Eugene Edwards, a student, claimed $20,000 damages against the Attorney-General representing the Ministry of Transport for wrongful arrest and $lO,OOO for false imprisonment. The jury’s award on Tuesday was based on the assumption that the defendant was liable for damages. Mr Justice

Eichelbaum still has to determine whether a traffic officer “committed an unlawful arrest”. He adjourned the matter to April 23 to continue legal argument. Mr Edwards was arrested in a private garage after he had been out to buy cigarettes. His Honour said that by law a traffic officer was given certain powers of arrest not as wide as those of a constable. He was given certain powers by act of Parliament to make an arrest. If the arrest had taken place on the road or in some public place there was no doubt that, provided the traffic officer

had the necessary good cause to suspect and he had gone through the required steps and had met a refusal, he would have had the power of arrest. “There are legal problems where the incident takes place on private property,” he said. “Without going into unnecessary detail, because this is what I will have to hear legal argument about, the main legal point at issue here is that the plaintiff contends that the power of arrest was not validly exercised in this case because it was exercised on private property after the traffic officer had entered that property by force.”