POLICE POWERS

v STOP AND SEARCH

Part 1 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE) empowers any constable acting with reasonable grounds for suspicion to stop, detain and search you or your vehicle, or anything in or on your vehicle for certain items, which may be seized. The provisions of the Act are supplemented by a Code of Practice on stop and search. The police must observe the contents of the Code, although the remedy for failure to observe it is usually to make a police complaint - or if prosecuted to raise an objection in court - rather than to take legal proceedings against the police.

PACE also provides some safeguards for other well-used police powers of search. These might relate, for instance, to searches for drugs or firearms and so on. The safeguards also apply in a limited way to controversial powers of stop and search introduced by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 when it is feared that an incident involving serious violence may take place.

The police do not have general powers, apart from those specified in a statute, to stop and search you, unless you consent. You should ask the police officer to explain on what basis they are searching you. If no search power exists you should be told that you do not have to consent and if you do not, you should not be searched.

The power to stop and search inPACE enables a constable to search for stolen or 'prohibited articles' or knives - except short-bladed penknives. PACE defines two categories of prohibited article:

• An offensive weapon.

• An article made or adapted for use in connection with one of a list of offences including burglary, theft, taking a conveyance without authority - or being carried in one - and obtaining property by deception.

Virtually any article could come within this second definition but there would have to be some evidence of the use of the article or the intention of the person making, adapting or carrying it, otherwise a constable would not have reasonable grounds to search.cogc gcr segcgcw orgc gck ingc fogc gc:

PACES power of stop and search may be used by the police in most public and some private places as follows:

• A place to which, at the time of the proposed stop and search, the public - or any section of the public - has access as a matter of legal right or because there is permission.
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• Any place - other than a dwelling - to which people have ready access at the time of the proposed stop and search.

These categories are obviously very wide and can include private property, for example front gardens and car parks. Whether you have ready access might depend on whether a gate or door is locked, or whether a plot of land is fenced.

However, a constable may not search you or your vehicle if you are on land, which is used for the purpose of a dwelling, without having reasonable grounds for believing that ...

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