In an exclusive interview with The Daily Telegraph, Mr Fuller expressed alarm about community opposition to strip searches saying young people on the verge of criminality should have “a little bit of fear” of police.
“My biggest issue at the moment is making sure the public understand why we need to be a force and understand it’s important to have powers and use those powers because if you don’t, there are consequences,” he said.
“There will be a generation of kids that have no respect for authority and no respect for the community
“The reality is we need to be a police force and part of that is searching people – which doesn’t make everyone happy – but people need to know there are consequences especially those who are criminals or on the verge of being criminals.
“They need to have respect for authority and have a little bit of fear for law enforcement.”
Mr Fuller fears a growing push from some organisations to soften police powers.
“You look at London. They decrease their person searches by 20,000 because of a government position and knife crime went through the roof,” he said. “When the legitimacy of policing communities is questioned it has a negative impact on public safety. It is under heavy scrutiny at the moment at its my job to protect those powers but also be mature enough to say ‘OK juvenile strip searches is a point of contention at the moment, some people are worried about it’, so we are going to do an immediate review of how they are conducted.”
In the past month, with NSW Deputy Coroner Harriet Grahame calling for restrictions on strip searches and sniffer dogs at music festivals, there has been a chorus of detractors of police tactics including from NSW Greens senator David Shoebridge, the Redfern Legal Centre, former Director of Public Prosecutions Nicholas Cowdery and other high-profile members of the legal profession.
Read the full article here (The Daily Telegraph, 18 November 2019)
