Evenin' all (some more senior people might see the joke),
I noticed a comment earlier today that there had been no contribution to
this discussion from any police subscribers. I cannot speak for The Police;
only for me. I work for a police force.
My view (and that of fellow practitioners in the policing arena) is the
police cannot decide in advance the likelihood of any evidence being
excluded if challenged as being unfair because it has been obtained by
means not in accordance with the data protection principles. Or indeed for
any other reason.
It is the task of a judge or magistrate to decide if evidence has been
obtained so unfairly that it should be excluded by way of Section 78 Police
and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE). Even then this can only be done at
the application of a defendant.
I see no problem with what the shopkeeper did - although the school might
have declined to give him the information unless there was certainty that
it was necessary for the investigation of the crime. He might have simply
wanted to sort a few kneecaps out.
If the story is correct it seems likely the shopkeeper spoke to a bod in a
police call-centre rather than a police investigator.
Does anyone share my suspicion that Chris Pounder made this one up just to
get people talking?
Regards,
Michael Doherty
Kent Police Data Protection Unit
01622 652066
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
All archives of messages are stored permanently and are
available to the world wide web community at large at
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/data-protection.html
If you wish to leave this list please send the command
leave data-protection to [log in to unmask]
All user commands can be found at : -
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/help/commandref.htm
(all commands go to [log in to unmask] not the list please)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
|