Euthanasia checkpoint ‘unlawful’
IPCA, Privacy Commissioner criticise police — who accepted they broke law
Apolice checkpoint targeting euthanasia supporters in Lower Hutt in 2016 was unlawful, the Independent Police Conduct Authority says.
The Privacy Commissioner also condemned police actions yesterday, saying officers unlawfully and unfairly collected personal information and harmed some of the people involved.
Police have accepted they broke the law — but maintain they “acted in order to protect life and did not intentionally break the law”.
The checkpoint on October 2 was set up to identify people who had attended an Exit International meeting that had just taken place.
Exit International is a euthanasia group.
Police had been monitoring the meeting with a surveillance device as part of an investigation into the death of Annemarie Treadwell, who had ingested pentobarbitone, a controlled drug used to euthanise animals.
Head of the Wellington branch of the group, Susan Austen, was found not guilty last month of helping Treadwell commit suicide, but was found guilty of importing the drug.
Austen said she was pleased with the authority’s findings.
“I think that people should be able to go to someone’s home and have a totally lawful meeting and gathering and not have to have any fear that there may be repercussions.”
The authority’s report says that while police were monitoring the meeting they overheard a discussion about how to import the drug and ways to commit suicide.
“It wasn’t until we heard [ them] conveying all these possibilities to commit suicide . . . that we were of the view that the risk level had raised considerably,” one officer told the IPCA.
The area commander believed the decision to set up the checkpoint was reasonable in the circumstances, the report said. pro-
Police planned to provide welfare support to those identified, and visited a number of people for that purpose several days after the checkpoint.
Police power to stop vehicles is for the purpose of enforcing land transport legislation, and because the checkpoint in question was not for that purpose, the IPCA found it was unlawful.
“It was an illegitimate use of police power that unlawfully restricted the right of citizens to freedom of movement,” said chairman Judge Colin Doherty.
However, the IPCA found the subsequent police welfare support visits did not breach the Privacy Act and were in accordance with operational policy and the duty of police to protect life and safety.
One woman who was visited by police said the welfare visit “seemed patronising to elderly people”.
“I mean, why should, just because one’s 85, one be assumed to be kind of helpless and weak and pathetic and needing comforting police to come and pat you on the back?”
Another woman said she’d never had contact with police before and immediately thought someone in her family had been in an accident.
Police Assistant Commissioner Bill Searle said police accepted the checkpoint had been unlawful.
However, the IPCA had acknowledged that the subsequent police welfare visits were in accordance with police policy and did not breach the Privacy Act.
Searle said police “fully recognise the sensitivities about euthanasia, however we take no moral position about this issue”.
Privacy Commissioner John Edwards said the visits from police left people feeling uncertain about their ability to speak freely, and anxious that more visits would follow. He said the way the information was collected breached the Privacy Act.
HWatch a video interview at nzherald.co.nz