Police need not fear investigators—head

Press, 4 April 1989, Page 6

Police need not fear investigators —head

By

PETER LUKE

in Wellington

The retiring Commissioner of Police, Mr Mai Churches, says that the police have nothing to fear from the independent Police Complaints Authority which began work yesterday.

Mr Churches said that as deputy commissioner he had spent three years working in the area of complaints against the police.

In his view the investigations, when handled by the police themselves, had been professionally done.

“So I don’t have any great fears as far as that is concerned,” he said.

But Mr Churches, who steps down this month, did express his fear at the increasing tendency of people to assault the police. “That is a very worrying and a very frightening thing. It’s bad enough for the officer to be attacked on duty, when he’s merely trying to keep the peace. It’s so much worse when his home is attacked and his family and himself put at risk.”

Last May, Mr Churches spoke out about attacks on the police in the Bay of Plenty and in Masterton,

saying the country- had come close to a breakdown in law and order. He said yesterday that although these trouble spots had died down, the police in other areas were still under trememdous pressure. Mr Churches, aged 55, became Commissioner of Police in January, 1987, after a career that included a five-year posting in Christchurch. His 26-month tenure as the nation’s top police officer coincided with growing industrial unrest from the Police Association, especially over rank-and-file demands for an increase in police numbers.

One association campaign prompted Mr Churches to condemn the association’s trade-union-like approach as damaging the image of the police.

He said yesterday that while he felt the association had done some excellent things, at times a commissioner had to say “no” to their demands.

“I do not think it helped the image of the individual police officer at all,” he said, referring to the earlier association campaign.

But Mr Churches made it clear he did not believe the police had sufficient funding, although it had been - attempting to streamline its activities to gain greater efficiences. “We have been doing those things but as I say I still think that additional funding is required.” The police could only respond by identifying priorities such as crimes against the person and offences that could be solved. “We have to be sure that we are not doing things that have virtually no likelihood of a result,” he said.

During his five-year stint with the Christchurch Criminal Investigation Branch from 1965

he headed several big homicide inquiries. He spoke yesterday about the growing propensity of violence being used to solve arguments, and the reaction this could cause in a police officer. “I don’t think you ever get used to seeing the victim of violence. I certainly never have. “And remeber that I was a police officer that sees, and has to clean up what somebody else has left, and they are not easy tasks.”

But in spite of increasing violence, especially against the police, Mr Churches opposes the routine arming of the police. “I do not support that at all. Nor, I think, does the average police officer. At present I do not think that is necessary.” Mr Churches, who plans to retire to the small community of Paraparamu Beach, just north of Wellington, singled out community support as a big recent positive step in policing. “The feedback you get from the community about what the police are doing throughout the country” was one of the great highlights of his job he would carry away with him.