ADVICE TO FRIEND

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 265, 5 August 1931, Page 11

ADVICE TO FRIEND

Policeman’s Inquiries

CASE O'F OBSTRUCTION

Judgment in a case in which a man had been charged with obstructing a police sergeant-by advising a companion not to tell him her name and address, was given in the Police'Court yesterday by Mr. E. Page, S.M. At the hearing, Mr. Childs, who appeared for the defendant, had dealt at some length with the rights of a policeman to question an individual. The magistrate had indicated, however, that the vital question was whether . the defendant was entitled to give his companion the advice he had. Mentioning yesterday in his judgment that obstruction did not have to be physical obstruction. the magistrate convicted the defendant and fined him £2.

“Shortly after midnight on June 21 last,” the magistrate said, describing the circumstances, “a police sergeant found the defendant'and a female companion in a yard in Tasman Street, and in interrogating them regarding some obscene language which from the public street he had heard the defendant's companion use. the sergeant asked the two for their names and addresses. The defendant replied that it was none of the sergeant’s business. The sergeant then asked the defendant’s companion her name and address on three several occasions, and each time the defendant told the companion not to give her name and whispered something to her. Not Necessarily Physical. “As a result of this instigation she gave the sergeant a wrong name and address. The sergeant was not satisfied with this, and took her to the police station, from where he scut out a constable to the given address in order to verify the information. It was found to be false. Eventually the sergeant obtained the correct name and address and allowed her to go. The defendant is now charged under section 77 of the Police Offences Act, 1927. with having wilfully obstructed the police sergeant in the execution of his duty.” It was well established, the magistrate continued, that the obstruction referred to in this section need not be a physical obstruction. In one particular case a defendant who had warned motorists of the proximity of a police trap, whereby the police were prevented from obtaining evidence of breaches of the law which were being committed, was held rightly convicted of having wilfully obstructed the police in the execution of their duty. Police Acted Reasonably. “In the present ease,” the magistrate said, “it seems to me clear that the police sergeant in making his inquiries of these two with a view to reporting the breach of the law that had been committed — the use of obscene language within hearing of passers-by in a public street —and with a view to a probable subsequent prosecution, was acting in a reasonable and proper way in the execution of his duty. It is clear also that the action of the defendant in advising the woman to give a false name did in fact obstruct the police sergeant in the execution of his duty.”