POLICE AND PRESS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22141, 21 June 1935, Page 14

POLICE AND PRESS

LEADING EXPERT'S VIEW

CLOSF. RELATIONS URGED

NEW ZEALAND RETICENCE

WHERE INVESTIGATORS FAIL

Significance to a question which vitally affects the.community in matters of public safety is given by Ex-Superin. tendent Percy Savage, of _ Scotland Yard's Criminal Investigation Depart, ment, discussing the relations of the police and the public in his recently, published autobiography,- "Savage 0 f Scotland Yard." The writer emphasises the grave neglect of the services avail, able in the press. ,

The subject is of considerable import, anco in New Zealand. There is as great a need in the Dominion for the police to secure the Co-operation of the public to the full as there is in England, or any other country. The absence of anv adequate system of supplying propy information on crime to the public, ijj. evitably through the press, has been a striking and unsatisfactory aspect of New Zealand conditions for many years and it parallels the comparative backwardness of police methods in the Do. minion, when advanced practice orerseas is taken into consideration. Gaining Public Confidence " In spite of the advantages which the progress of science and thought has delivered into the hands oPthe police authorities, there is one important and valuable arm of defence and offence that is sadly neglected," writes Ex. Superintendent Savage. " I refer to the lack of efficient co-operation between the police and the public'. It is a strange and regrettable fact that there is—and always has been —a strong disinclination in certain police circles to take the public fulh r and frankly into their confidence. "When a murder or other grave crime is committed, why should not the publie be informed of the. essential facts, consistent, of course, with the interests of justice? And yet what happens? Information is frequently withheld from the press—the sole medium of coinmunication with the public—and the consequence is that details which ought to be known are not divulged, false rumours are started, and the investigating officers grope about in an atmosphere of chaos and doubt. The police want information. The public have it. Why not effect a working partnership? Fidelity o! Newspapers " It is urged by those who favour the policy of silence that the press is more concerned r>ith getting a ' good story ' than with ! the interests of justice, and that they would magnify or distort any facts which were officially supplied. Personally, I think that anybody who is afraid of the press is afraid of himself. Newspapers are quite capable of taking care of themselves, and they know full well the limits to which they can go in any given case. In my capacity as a senior officer, *1 always used my discretion and gave the press all the information I possibly could. Oh not a single occasion hare I- known newspapers to go beyond these facts or to give publicity to facts which I asked thnm not to mention. 1 could quote cases in which murderers and other criminals have not been caught because the public have not been told the points on which their assistance was wanted by the police. y Orime Prevention "It is not only in the detection of crime that the public could bo such'a valuable ally of the police. The' work of preventing crime—the policeman's primary duty—would be rendered far more effective if the police enlisted the prompt aid of the press in warning the public against the wily tricks and devices of criminals and adopting other methods to stifle any particular form of crime before it became epidemic. In my opinion more criminals would be caught and crime would materially decrease if responsible police officers were empowered to see accredited newspaper representatives and explain the varioui stages in the progress of an investigation." ' ; The public should be aware of the attitude of the police in many parts of New Zealand. A frequent experience in Auckland for some years past hai been for officers investigating burglaries and other cases to warn citizens not to supply information to the press, * pr°* cedure the police, incidentally, are not entitled to adopt.