The Police and the Law
| Date | 01 April 1952 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X5202500202 |
| Published date | 01 April 1952 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
80
THE
POLICE
JOURNAL
fact that so many have joined the force in recent years or had their
police careers interrupted by war service.
In
addition to the Metropolitan, the county, city and borough
forces of Great Britain, full-time serving members of the Royal Ulster
Constabulary, the police forces of the Isle of
Man
and the Channel
Islands, in the constabularies of Government departments and the
British Transport Commission,
in"
the Dock Police forces of the United
Kingdom, and the constabulary maintained by the Ulster
Transport
authority, are entitled to the award of the medal.
The
Police and the Law
ACTION
FOR
MALICIOUS
PROSECUTION
NOT
COMPETENT
VVHEN
PROSECUTION IS '
SUCCESSFUL'
THE plaintiff in an action against a police officer or other person
for malicious prosecution must, in order to succeed, prove that the
prosecution in question ended in his favour. He must, of course,
prove other things, too,
but
if the prosecution was successful
that
is
the end of the matter.
If
the rule were otherwise every case would
have to be retried on its merits and
that
would, in effect, be turning the
civil court into a court of appeal from the final decisions of the criminal
courts. As an old authority
put
it, such decisions cannot be " blowed
off by a side-wind." But can the criminal prosecution be said to be
successful for this purpose if the plaintiff was not sentenced to imprison-
ment
or fined
but
merely bound
over?
This
question was raised and
settled in the recent case of Everett v. Ribbands (lIS,
J.P.
S82).
In
this action for malicious prosecution against a police officer
and another person it appeared that the officer had at the instance of
the latter laid an information before a Metropolitan magistrate
and
was
granted asummons alleging
that
the plaintiffhadsent offensive postcards
and letters through the post and had unlawfully loitered at a certain
address with intent to cause a breach of the peace. At the conclusion
of the hearing of these summonses the magistrate ordered the plaintiff
to enter into a recognisance and to find two sureties in
£20
each within
seven days to keep the peace and to be of good behaviour for twelve
months, or, in default, to serve one month's imprisonment.
The
plaintiff duly found the sureties.
In
the subsequent action for malicious
prosecution the two defendants contended
that
there was no cause for
action because the prosecution had been successful.
This
contention
was held by
Mr.
Justice Devlin to be sound and judgment was given
for the defendants.
It
has been held in earlier cases that the rule that it is essential
to show that the proceeding alleged to have been instituted maliciously
and without reasonable and probable cause has terminated in favour
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