Editorial
Norml News 1994 Winter
Well, it looks like the police have been very naughty boys and girls lately. Naughty boys mostly.
New Zealand has been galvanised by a story of a man who died from suffocation after being shoved in the back of a police car, handcuffed in an, usually cruel manner, had a jacket wrapped around his head, laid with his stomach over the drive-shaft arch, and was sat on. And the journey took the police travelling at high speed around 35 minutes, while a news team travelling the same route at 50kmlh took 20 minutes.
What did they do on route?
We have a man detained in custody for 21 days so the police can look through his faeces. Then, after a High Court judge tells the police that they must release him from detention, they arrest him and continue to hold him in police custody in an attempt to get round the requirements of the law.
Perhaps most shocking, we hear about a woman in Northland who was handcuffed and raped by a constable. When she tried to make a complaint the local police did all they could to shut her up and discredit her, even going so far as to print and circulate malicious leaflets. And then, get this, we hear that the cover-up went all the way to the Assistant Commissioner of Police, who ordered that a file containing the constable's fingerprints be destroyed.
I am not one to generalise about police officers. Mike Meyrick, interviewed in this issue, shows clearly that honesty and a uniform do mix. But the police service has a very hard job maintaining credibility when things like this go on. It's not so much that they happen - there are bad apples in every basket. What makes people lose faith is that the cops always get away with it.
If the police really faced up to the problems of corruption, abuse of power, racism, unnecessary violence, and general bad attitude that is so apparent to anyone who has been on the receiving end of a police 'enquiry', then they could earn the respect of the community. The police as a group don't act any worse than most people - the difference is their refusal to acknowledge their problems, or do anything about them.
It is timely, therefore, that a campaign to make the police complaints authority more independent and open is underway. Those NORML members who received the last NN will also have got a petition on the Police Complaints Authority. Thank you to all of the people that filled those in and returned them. We have forwarded them to the people running the campaign, knowing that NORML members support this allied cause.
In the meantime, it is important that we continue to use those channels open to us to complain about police misbehaviour. Any cop caught doing naughties won't get into serious trouble, but the continual speaking out is what will set the stage for change.
As Mr Robert Nesta Marley say: "Every day the bucket a go a well. One day the bottom "must drop out".
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