TESTS OF SOBRIETY
ENGLISH COURT CASES POLICE METHODS CRITICISED LONDON. March X A novel test was applied to an actor who was charged with drunkenness outside Covent Garden Opera House. Six doctors were called, and all gave conflicting evidence. Finally a police surgeon, cross-examined, admitted that one of the tests was that the actor was asked to tie bis dress bow without the aid of a mirror. At his first effort he did it badly, but at the second test reasonably well. "It was a very unfair test," said the doctor. The actor interjected: "Yet I managed it!" Whereupon the magistrate dismissed the charge. Mr. Justice Swift, at the Liverpool Assizes, strongly protested against police methods of examining motorists detained on suspicion of being under the influence of drink. " I object to those inroads on British freedom," he said. "The police have no right to apply tests to a man like defendant without his consent. If they contend he was able to give consent they have no business to come to Court and say he was drunk, because drunkenness destroys consent." The jury stopped the case and accused was discharged.
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New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21743, 7 March 1934, Page 9
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190TESTS OF SOBRIETY New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21743, 7 March 1934, Page 9
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