Assault on Police Flashcards
Q: What is the law on assault on police?
S89 Police Act 1996
(1) Any person who assaults a constable in the execution of his duty, or a person assisting a constable in the execution of his duty, shall be guilty of an offence.
Q: What type of offence is assault on police?
Summary offence
Maximum sentence of 6 months imprisonment and/or fine
Q: Who does this offence cover?
Constables and also covers those that assist! It is not just the officer!
Q: What must be shown for this offence?
Officer must be acting in the execution of his duty when assault- if not proven then the AR will be missing.
Even a minor, technical and inadvertent act of unlawfulness on the part of the officer will mean he cannot have been acting in the lawful execution of his duty.
Q: How are the limits of a constable’s duty defined?
Precise limits of a constable’s duty remain undefined.
To be acting in the course of his duty, the constable must be acting within the general scope of a duty imposed on him by law such as his duty to keep the peace or to protect life and property.
He must not be acting unlawfully at the time.
Q: Examples of when a constable is acting outside of his duty?
Any action amounting to assault, battery, unlawful arrest or trespass to property takes the officer outside the course of his/her duty (Davis 1936)
Q: What if the assault is made in reaction to a physical act by an officer?
Where the assault is made in reaction to some form of physical act by the officer, it must be shown that the officer’s act was not in itself unlawful.
Q: What powers do police have to detain someone?
Other than the powers of arrest and detention, police officers have no general power to take hold of people in order to question them or keep them at a particular place while background inquiries are made about them
Q: Is taking hold of someone by the arm ‘battery’ if done for questioning?
If an officer does hold someone by the arm for questioning without arrest, there may well be a ‘battery’ by that officer (Collins- 1984)
The courts have accepted, however, that there may be occasions where a police officer is justified in taking hold of a person to attract his/her attention or to calm him/her down (Mepstead- 1996)
Q: What if a custody officer is assaulted and the original arrest turns out to have been unlawful?
Where a prisoner is arrested and brought before a custody officer, that officer is entitled to assume that the arrest has been lawful. Therefore, if the prisoner goes on to assault the custody officer, that assault will be an offence under s. 89(1) even if the original arrest turns out to have been unlawful (DPP v L- 1999)
Q: Must it be shown that D knew or suspected that the person was a police officer?
There is no need to show that the defendant knew, or suspected, that the person was in fact a police officer or that the police officer was acting in the lawful execution of his/her duty (Bowering- 1994)
Q: Is self-defence available?
If D claims to have been acting in self-defence under the mistaken and honestly held belief that he/she was being attacked, there may not be sufficient MR for a charge of assault
