Police Misconduct

The Superintendent of Police laid charges of police misconduct against a Redan constable in December 1872.

Details
As reported in the Ballarat Star on Christmas Day in 1872: SUPERINTENDENT OF POLICE V. CONSTABLE GRACE. —Misconduct as, a police constable in assaulting Slattery when in custody. Mr Purcell appeared for the defendant. Slattery stated that on the 31st October, at half-past four, he accompanied by miners named Howling, Clarke, and Hayes when returning from work at the No.2 Band of Hope mine, went into the Redan Club hotel, to have a drink, and when there they saw Constable Grace pass with a Chinaman in custody. They went into a baker’s shop next door, and Slattery was laughing at the Chinaman, when Grace told him to go about his business, or he would lock him up, adding words to the effect that he knew him. He replied, “ You go to __; what do you know of me?” The constable then rushed him, seized him by the collar, and took him in charge. Shortly after. Constable Moran came up, and he asked him to go quietly. He replied he-would go anywhere with Moran. Crossing the road, Grace had him by the collar, and suddenly tripped him up and knocked him on has back. When he got to the lockup he could not see “ the sky over him,” and he afterwards, being excited, told Grace he would “break his eye.” A charge was entered against him of inciting a prisoner to escape from custody. He was let out on his own bail, and the charge against him was dismissed. In answer to Mr Purcell, he said he had once been fined for assaulting Constable Kilfedder, and he admitted the charge because, as he was going into the court, Constable Kilfedder told him “ not to contradict what he said, or Constable Crowley would go into the box and make it hot for him.” He never shook a whip over the head of a constable at Bungaree, but in a row there he assisted the police, and was thanked for it. Howling and Hayes generally corroborated Slattery’s statement, and from their evidence it appeared that the constable threatened to lock up Slattery before the latter gave him any reason to do so. Hayes stated that Slattery had asked the constable to take his hands off him, and the constable then threw him down, and the constable’s hat fell off.

Constable Moran, in charge of Redan station, said that he went over to Grace and Slattery, and the latter asked if he was to go to the station, and he replied he was, and asked him to go quietly. Slattery said he would do so. He took the Chinaman, and Grace and Slattery followed, and on the way he looked round, in consequence of hearing an altercation, and, saw Slattery on the ground and the constable’s hat about three yards away on the road. Had known Constable Grace for five months. Had not heard any complaint against him. A boy, eleven years old, named John Alexander, said that Slattery had told Grace to let the Chinaman go, and Grace told him to mind his own business. When the constable caught hold of him, Slattery knocked his hat off. In the centre of the road Slattery raised his hand to strike the constable, who put him down on his back. When Grace told him to come on, he said, “Ain’t I coming, you wretch.” Zachariah Bath, a lad thirteen years’ old, having made several stumbles in defining an oath and giving his view as to a future state of punishment, corroborated the evidence of the other boy. Mr Gaunt, in imposing a fine of 20s said he thought the constable had lost his head on the occasion, and it would have been better had he thought that Slattery was in the wrong, to have summoned him instead of arresting him. The arrest was wrongful.