When Police Complaint Mechanisms Fail

McCulloch Jude & Palmer Darren , ‘Civil litigation by citizens against Australian police between 1994 and 2002’ (2003); Smith Graham , ‘Actions for Damages Against the Police and the Attitudes of Claimants’ (2003) 13(4) Policing and Society; Watch Human Rights , Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States (1998).

Freckelton Ian , ‘Shooting the Messenger’ in Goldsmith Andrew (ed) Complaints against the Police (1991) 75.

Ibid 73.

CMC report <cmc.qld.gov.au/asp/index.asp> at 22 May 2011.

Communication to the UN dated 19 August 2008 from Corinna Horvath under the 1st Optional Protocol to the ICCPR, <communitylaw.org.au/flemingtonkensington/cb_pages/uncommunication.php> at 22 May 2011.

Koori Complaints Project 2006–2008, Final Report, 22. More recently complaints of police racism have been aired, and in some cases, flatly rejected by the Police Association Victoria. Moor Keith , ‘Victoria Police accused of anti-Aboriginal racism’ Herald Sun (Melbourne), 7 April 2011, <heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/police-accused-of-anti-koori-racism/story-fn7x8me2-1226034970593> at 22 May 2011.

See, eg, 2010 Braidwood Inquiry, BC Canada, the European Court of Human Rights in Jordan v The United Kingdom [2001] ECHR 327, Means v City of Chicago 535 F Supp 168 (ND Ill 1982).

Opinion of the Commissioner for Human Rights, ‘Concerning independent and effective determination of complaints against the police’, CommDH (2009) 4 <https://wcd.coe.int/wcd/ViewDoc.jsp?id=1417857&Site=CommDH> at 25 May 2011.

RCIADIC, National Report 5, Recommendation 226, <austlii.edu.au/au/other/IndigLRes/rciadic/national/vol5/5.html#Heading24> at 21 May 2011.

OPI Victoria investigated 3% of complaints: Annual Report 2008/2009. PIC NSW investigated 0.3% of complaints (2008/2009 Annual Report). CMC Qld does not provide statistics, but has a policy of referring complaints to the police for investigation. CCC WA investigated 1% of complaints in 2008/2009. An internal police unit investigates in Tasmania. The Ombudsman NT refers complaints to the police for investigation.

Gooda Mick , 20 years on from the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody: Where to now? (Speech delivered at Redfern NSW, 12 April 2011).

See, eg, UNCAT General Comment No 2, 23 November 2007.

Concluding observations of the Committee against Torture, 15 May 2008 Australia, para 27.

Concluding observations of the Human Rights Committee, 3 April 2009 on Australia, para 21.

Hopkins Tamar , An Effective system for investigating complaints against the police (2009).

OPI 2008, Annual Report, page 32.

See Prenzler Tim , Police Corruption: Preventing Misconduct and Maintaining Integrity (2009).

Ellison Graham , ‘A Blue Print for Democratic Policing Anywhere in the World?’ (2007) 10 Police Quarterly 243.

Naphtali Tippa , ‘Vancouver police chief calls for greater powers for complaints unit’, from The Globe & Mail, 6 October 2010 <http://4wardeveruk.org/2010/10/vancouver-police-chief-calls-for-greater-powers-for-complaints-unit/> at 25 May 2011.

See McCulloch & Palmer , above n 1; Smith , above n 1, 413–422.

Ransley Janet Anderson Jessica & Prenzler Tim , ‘Civil Litigation Against the Police in Australia’ (2007) 40 ANZ Journal of Criminology 2, 148.

See Smith , above n 1, and Craig Futterman, The Use of Statistical Evidence to Address Police Supervisory and Disciplinary Practices (2008) 1(2) DePaul Journal for Social Justice.

See, eg, police interview in McCulloch & Palmer , above n 1, 98.

See OPI, ‘A Fairer Disciplinary System’ (2007) 36.

Re Doherty [2008] UKHL 33, [2008] 1WLR 1499, an appeal in judicial review proceedings relating to the decision of a panel of Life Sentence Review Commissioners.

Briginshaw v Briginshaw 60 CLR 336 (30 June 1938)

See, eg, in 2004 in 57.7% of cases where excessive use of force had been substantiated, the NY Police Dept did not discipline the officer involved at all: Civil Liberties Union, Mission Failure, Civilian Review of Policing in New York City (2006) 53.

Civil proceedings are not a sufficient remedy for human rights abuses. Disciplinary and in some cases criminal processes are also required.

Section 69 of the Police Regulation Act 1958.

McCulloch & Palmer , above n 1, 97.

See, eg, comment from retired Supreme Court Judge Bill Carter on 4 February 2010 in The Australian (Sydney) <theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/crime-body-lacks-teeth/story-e6frg6zo-1225826533065> at 21 May 2011.

Originally from Civil Rights Act of 1871 (the Ku Klux Klan Act).

365 US 167, section 1983.

Christianberg Garment Co v EEOC, 434 US 4012 (1978).

Taylor Flint , ‘A litigator's view of discovery and proof in police misconduct policy and practice cases’ (1999) 38(3) DePaul Law Review, 747.

Futterman , above n 22.

The National Lawyers Guild has a National Police Accountability Project which supports the work of these lawyers.

Wright Michael Herron Caroline Rand & Levine Richard , ‘Civil Convictions in Greensboro’ New York Times (New York, US), 9 June 1985, <nytimes.com/1985/06/09/weekinreview/the-nation-civil-convictions-in-greensboro.html> at 21 April 2011.

Hampton v Hanrahan 446 US 754 (1980).

Palmer v City of Chicago 562 F. Supp. 1067 (ND Ill.) (1983).

Wilson v City of Chicago 6 F.3d 1233 (1993).

Czajkowski v City of Chicago 810 F Supp 1428 (ND Ill.) (1992).

See, eg, Means v City of Chicago 535 F Supp 168 (ND Ill. 1982).

See, eg, the 2003 Cincinatti Consent Decree.

Interview with Tayfanye Om, police accountability project worker (Ella Baker Centre for Human Rights), September 2008.

Interview with Raju Bhatt (founding partner, Bhatt Murphy), 2 December 2008.

Smith , above n 1.

Ibid.

R v Chief Constable of the West Midlands, ex p. Wiley [1994] UKHL 8 (14 July 1994).

Taylor Matthew and Williams Rachel , ‘Metropolitan police pays Muslim man £60,000 damages over “serious attack”’, guardian.co.uk <guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/mar/18/babar-ahmed-met-police/print> at 25 May 2011.

Channel 9, ‘Vic police hush money unveiled’, National Nine News, 8 March 2010, <http://video.au.msn.com/watch/video/vic-police-hush-money-unveiled/xngygee> at 25 May 2011.

The 1989 Fitzgerald Inquiry into government and police corruption and misconduct stated, ‘The ultimate check on public maladministration is public opinion, which can only be truly effective if there are structures and systems designed to ensure that it is properly informed. … Information is the lynch-pin of the political process… If the public is not informed, it cannot take part in the political process with any real effect.’

[2003] UKHL 51

Dodd Vikram , ‘MI5 and MI6 to be sued for the first time over torture’, from The Guardian UK, 12 September 2007 <christiankhan.co.uk/ViewNews.asp?NewsID=142> at 25 May 2011.

Harrison , ‘Police Misconduct legal remedies’ (4th ed, 2005) 433, Section 88 of the Police Act 1996.

See, eg, Birnberg Pierce, Bhatt Murphy, Christian Khan, Imran Khan and Associates, Inquest, Liberty.

Enever v The King (1906) 3 CLR 969. Legislative amendments to this common law position vary across states and territories.

Victoria Legal Aid Grant Handbook, Ch 2, 25. Legal aid may be granted to assess merits and settle disputes.

There are two well-known firms in this category in Victoria.

Hovarth v Christensen, County Court of Victoria, 23 February 2001.

ICCPR, General Comment No 31 [80] The Nature of the General Legal Obligation Imposed on States Parties to the Covenant, UN Doc CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.13 (2004).

McCulloch & Palmer , above n 1, 91.