LAX METHODS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25305, 16 August 1943, Page 2

LAX METHODS

DEPARTMENTAL PROSECUTIONS CRITICISM BY MAGISTRATE (P.A.) HAMILTON, Aug. 14. Strong comment on the manner in which prosecutions by Government departments are conducted was contained in a reserved judgment given by Mr S. L. Paterson, S.M., in a case in which the district nian-power officer, Mr C. A. Beaufort, prosecuted Charles John Reid, a labourer, of Hamilton, for failure to obey an order to report for work at the Tokanui Mental Hospital. The magistrate said the information must be dismissed, not because he thought the defendant was not guilty, but because guilt had not been proved by proper legal evidence. The man-power officer had conducted the prosecution in person, but did not appear to be conversant with the rules of evidence. In fact, he did net appear to realise that any evidence was necessary. He made an excellent statement of the facts of the case, and said that was his case. The magistrate said he did not blame the officer concerned. It was probably not his fault, but the fault of the heads of his department. The Government maintained a Crown Law Office and Crown prosecutors, who should be instructed to prosecute in these matters. Such assistance was of even greater importance in view of the spate of regulations issued almost daily. Many of these regulations appeared to have been hastily drawn as well as being ultra vires. Some of them also abrogated old established rules °f evidence Prosecutions under the regulations not infrequently came before justices. who were not lawyers nor were they conversant with the rules of evidence. In just such a case as the one before the court they might think that the man-power officer’s statement was sufficient proof, and wrongly enter a conVl ln°re'cent years, said Mr Paterson, there had been a large increase in the number of Government officers and inspectors appearing in courts to conduct prosecutions. Very few of them had the ability, training, or aptitude for such work. Their efforts impeded rather than assisted the administration of justice. In the present case the man-power officer who gave evi dence was not the officer who dealt with the defendant. Therefore his evidence was hearsay, and not admissible Tn documents produced w . ere „" ot W ac their authenticated or proved, nor was their service proved in the manner prescribed by the regulations.