MUST PAY PENALTY

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 120, 17 November 1936, Page 11

MUST PAY PENALTY

SYDNEY POLICEMEN

CITIZEN'S WRONGFUL ARREST

(Received November 17, 11.15 a.m.)

SYDNEY, This Day.

The Premier; Mr. B. S. B. Stevens announced that Cabinet had decided that the three police officers who were successfully proceeded against by Robert Manners for wrongful arrest and ill-treatment, must pay their own costs and the £300 damages awarded against them. Cabinet considered that the jury's verdict should be regarded as binding. Cabinet's decision is in spite of the fact that the Acting Commissioner of Police, Mr. Lynch, recommended in his report to the Government that the Crown should foot the bill.

Cabinet directed that Sergeant Silcock be reverted to uniform duty, and that Constables Murray and Roach be retained on uniform duty.

An action for damages against three members of the Sydney Police Force, who were sued for wrongful arrest, false imprisonment, and assault, ended on September 18 in favour of the plaintiff, Robert Percy Manners, who was awarded £100 damages on each count, a total of £300. Manners, a journeyman printer, gave evidence that while going to his home late at night in the [Redfern district he saw three men bundling another man into a car. He received a scare and began to run away, but was himself pursued, caught, and very roughly handled by two of the three men, who were Detective J. H. Silcock, Constable G. Murray, and Constable G Roach. Manners stated that he was punched and bullied, and finally taken by car to the police station, where he established a case of mistaken identity and was released. The police were apparently looking for a man who snatched a woman's handbag. Each of the defendants denied assault, The Chief Justice, SixFrederick Jordan, said that the police had no right to arrest a citizen unless they were prepared, to charge him with an offence immediately. The treatment of Manners constituted serious assault.