Monthly Archives: November 2024

Much of a solicitor’s time is spent at the police station, the magistrates’ court or in the crown court. However, occasionally cases proceed to the giddy heights of the High Court, the Court of Appeal or even the Supreme Court.

Ian Carter recently dealt with a case at the magistrates’ court which has then been subject to an appeal before the High Court.

In the case of DPP v Price and anor, the High Court was asked to consider whether the new offence of Assault upon an Emergency Worker, which was introduced in 2018, was substantially different from the previous offence of Assaulting a Constable in the execution of his duty.

The first obvious difference is that the new offence covers all emergency workers and not just police officers. Practically the vast majority of cases involve assaults upon the police, rather than upon fire fighters or ambulance workers.

The more subtle difference is in the wording – for an assault on a police officer it had to be shown that he was acting at all times in the exercise of his duties as in ‘strictly lawfully’. If an officer made an honest mistake in terms of wrongly detaining a person or wrongfully trespassing on private property, then it was a clear defence to the charge.

The new charge used a phrase, in that the assault had to be upon an emergency worker acting in their functions as an emergency worker. In 2018 it was assumed that the change of wording made no difference. However, in the case of Darby and in the preceding case of Campbell v DPP it was held that the fact that a policeman was not acting lawfully did not necessarily mean that they were acting outside their functions. Whilst if a person is being unlawfully assaulted by a police officer, it can still be argued that he is entitled to use force to defend himself, it can seem that the only requirement for a police man to be acting in his functions is that he is wearing his uniform and his hat.

The law has become tougher for people who find themselves being subjected by unlawful behaviour from the police. It is therefore even more important that if you are in trouble with the police that you get somebody like Ian Carter on your side from the start!