OUR POLICE.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume IX, Issue 453, 30 March 1899, Page 18

OUR POLICE.

Judging from recent developments, the police of Auckland either are allowed too much scope in their efforts to make cases, or they are going beyond the rules laid down for their guidance by custom. Sly grog selling is an evil much to be deprecated, and for its existence at all, I presume, we must thank our prohibition friends, but that is merely en passant, the question is how to eradicate it. I am of opinion that the members of the Trade, and the reputable portion of the community, not connected with the Trade, will agree that every legitimate means should be employed to stamp it out, but both sections mentioned will assuredly object to the introduction of a system so purely Russian as that employed in the case against Mary Dooley, heard before magistrate AVardell on AVednesday of last week. AVhether the woman was guilty or not (the case was dismissed) the means employed by the police to secure a conviction were of a most objectionable character. Two young persons of the male, persuasion, I can hardly call them men, either volunteered or were employed by the police to tempt this woman to commit a breach of the law, and when, after considerable solicitation, they partially succeeded, they immediately reported to the police, and a prosecution was subsequently entered upon. As for the parties who undertook this work at the instignation of the police I have nothing to say, except that I hardly thought such creatures could be found in Auckland. They may be dismissed with the natural opprobrium which is bound to cling to them, but it is with the police themselves that I join issue for initiating this method of attempting to secure convictions. Once evidence, such as they brought forward, is allowed to obtain in a court of justice in Auckland, no man’s liberty or reputation is safe, and Mr AVardell deserves the thanks of the community for promptly stigmatising it as tainted, and accepting what would ordinarily, have been s. weak defence in rebuttal. If the police adopt this line of conduct in one case, they will do it in another. and it is only a step from this to the introduction of domiciliary visits, with the attendant evil of distrust between man and man, and even between members of the same family, which is one of the terrible features of life in many countries on the Continent of Europe. More’s the pity, men or things can be found in all communities willing and ready to do dirty work, and as we can’t possibly stamp this species of vermin out, we must endeavor to control the authority and action of those who employ them, and just here, I would like to ask if the Government sanctions the method of procedure its servants are taking. The case of Mary Dooley is not the only one that has recently come before the public, as a short time ago it was shown that in the Wanganui district a Maori was regularly employed by the police ata daily wage and the half of the fine if his evidence secured a conviction. In one case that was reported, he went to a grocery shop and represented, with tears running down his cheeks, that his wife was dying and that if he he could only get a bottle of brandy he might save her. The liquor was forth coming, and a conviction followed, the

Maori receiving his share of the fine inflicted. Now, this system of catching transgressors, is thoroughly abominable and distinctly un-English, and, furthermore, it places a power in the hands of the police that it was never intended they should have. Carried out to its logical conclusion, it means, that if this innovation is not sternly checked, we shall soon be absolutely helpless and at the beck and call of a body of men who will have all the power, if perhaps not the will, to blackmail us to their hearts content. We don’t want a repetition of the police scandals of New York City in Auckland. AVe don’t want a modern nineteeth century New Zealand Pretorian Guard to rule us. AVe want the police to remain in the position they were originally intended to take, namely, guardians of the public peace, protectors of property, detectors of crime, and first, and always, servants of the public.