R v Chief Constable of the West Midlands Police, ex parte Wiley ; R v Chief Constable of Nottinghamshire Police, ex parte Sunderland

JurisdictionEngland & Wales
Judgment Date16 December 1992
Date16 December 1992
CourtQueen's Bench Division

Queen's Bench Division

Before Mr Justice Popplewell

Regina
and
Chief Constable of The West Midlands, Ex parte Wiley Regina v Chief Constable of Nottinghamshire, Ex parte Sunderland Regina v Police Complaints Authority, Ex parte Wiley Regina v Police Complaints Authority, Ex parte Johnson

Evidence - police complaints papers - not available for civil proceedings

Police complaints papers cannot be used in civil case

Documents which were created and came into existence for the purpose of a police complaints investigation were not to be used for any purpose in civil proceedings except to enable a legal adviser to advise on discovery.

Any enquiry carried out by the Police Complaints Authority would be seriously handicapped by the fact that a complainant would be unwilling to make a statement which could be used to his disadvantage in civil proceedings.

When determining whether to grant the police's request for a dispensation from the investigation of a complaint, the Police Complaints Authority were not obliged to consider the reasonableness of the refusal or failure by a complainant to make a statement.

Mr Justice Popplewell so held in the Queen's Bench Division when allowing applications of Kelvin Raymond Wiley and Tony Sunderland for judicial review of the decisions of the Chief Constables of the West Midlands and Nottinghamshire respectively, refusing to give undertakings that documents created in relation to police complaints investigations would not be used or relied upon in civil proceedings brought by the applicants, and dismissing Mr Wiley's and Anne Johnson's applications for judicial review of the decisions of the Police Complaints Authority which dispensed with the requirements to investigate the applicants' complaints.

Mr Frederic Reynold, QC and Mr Richard Clayton for Mr Wiley; Mr Richard Clayton for Mr Sunderland and Ms Johnson; Mr Jeremy Gompertz, QC, Mr Gareth Evans and Mr Stuart Sleeman for the chief constables; Mr David Pannick, QC, for the Police Complaints Authority.

MR JUSTICE...

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