Unsurprisingly, the recently released rethinking Strip Searches by NSW Police report drew the ire of the force. Commissioned by the Redfern Legal Centre, the UNSW report caused reigning state police commissioner Mick Fuller to criticize it very publicly.
In mid-September, Full tried unsuccessfully to prevent the strip search document being added to the record of the state inquest into deaths at music festivals.
The report reveals that between 2006 and present, strip searches by NSW police have increased twentyfold. It calls for an overhaul of strip search laws, so as to clarify how officers should be carrying out this invasive procedure.
Dr Vicki Sentas co-authored the report, as well as the 2017 Policing Young People report, which raised public awareness about the secretive Suspect Targeting Management Plan (STMP) that NSW police has been running since 2000.
Sydney Criminal Lawyers spoke to Vicki Sentas about the implications of the strip search report findings, her take on the shift towards policing that deals with future crime, and why law reform is a necessary component of bringing about a change in policing practice and culture.
“While we were not surprised by the predictable patterns in the case studies provided by lawyers, it really struck us that the police’s own data supported what the lawyers have been saying for years: that strip searches are happening when there’s nothing serious or urgent to justify what’s a highly intrusive search,” Dr Sentas said.
91 percent of all recorded strip searches are for the reason of the suspicion of drug possession and only 30 per cent of all strip searches end in charges.
“If the majority of strip searches being done for drug possession – and the majority don’t actually find anything – it’s improbable that the circumstances were so serious and so urgent to justify the search,” she said.
Read the full interview here (Sydney Criminal Lawyers, 11 November 2019)
