The Police and the Law
| Published date | 01 October 1940 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X4001300402 |
| Date | 01 October 1940 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
The Police and the Law
THE
POWER
OF SUMMARY ARREST
IN
addition to the common law power of any member of the
public to arrest a felon or a person breaking the peace, and
the further power of a police officer to arrest on reasonable
suspicion of felony, Parliament has from time to time found
it desirable to give powers of summary arrest in respect of
numerous offences.
This
right of interference has, as is well
known, been conferred somewhat capriciously, or at least not
in accordance with any clearly ascertainable principle. Such
absence of system may be deplored by those who like their
law to possess at least a formal perfection, and although
the
absence of principle renders a knowledge of the law more
difficult for those who are charged with its execution,
it
could
not seriously be maintained that this has itself been productive
of any serious practical difficulties.
The
same cannot, how-
ever, be said of the unfortunate practice of using different
words to express what may (or may not) be
the
same thing.
Thus
whereas in some statutes it is expressly stated that the
power of arrest can be exercised on reasonable suspicion, in
others expressions such as
"seen
committing,"
"found
offending,"
the"
offender," are used which, in spite of their
literal meaning, would appear to have been intended to convey
that an arrest could be effected where there was only reasonable
suspicion that an offence had actually been committed.
This
slovenliness of the legislature has had as its inevitable
consequence adiversity of judicial rulings, where uniformity
is eminently desirable.
For
although in many cases the right
of arrest is conferred on any member of the public, in practice
in most cases it will be a police officer who has to exercise it,
and it cannot be in the public interest that
the
police should
either give the impression of being chary of exercising rights
of arrest conferred for the benefit of law-abiding citizens, or
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