WARRANTLESS SEARCHES AND AWARDS FOR DAMAGES IN LIGHT OF THE JUDGMENT IN Shashape v The Minister of Police Case No.: 1566/2018

The law of criminal procedure is “double functional” in that it not only dictates the proper procedure for the execution of police functions but also serves as a ground of justification in substantive law against otherwise unlawful conduct. Nevertheless, personal liberties, even in the pursuit of justice in a country overrun by crime, cannot be sacrificed indiscriminately simply to further the diligent investigation of crime.An example of personal liberties being sacrificed in favour of the pursuit of justice is the search and seizure of private spaces of individuals. Search and seizure may be effected both with and without a warrant and is regulated by the Criminal Procedure Act 51 of 1977 (CPA). However, where a police official acts outside of this legislative matrix, his or her conduct is not regarded as lawful; he or she may not rely on official capacity as a ground of justification against an (unlawful) search. In such instances, the Minister of Police may be vicariously liable in delict owing to the unlawful conduct of police officials. Such cases are relatively rare.This contribution will focus on two specific aspects – namely, search and seizure conducted without a warrant, and subsequent awards for damages based on unlawful, warrantless searches. The recent judgment in Shashape v The Minister of Police (WHC (unreported) 2020-04-30 Case no 1566/2018 (Shashape)) is discussed against this backdrop.

Feeling the Pressure

Similar to the street-level bureaucrats in Lipsky’s classic study, the custody officers met in the course of fieldwork for this study were faced with a dilemma emergent from competing occupational demands and police functions. On the one hand, they were conscious of their statutory duties under PACE to act as guardians of suspects’ rights, and that the routine practices of their fellow officers could undermine the right to liberty. On the other, they were confronted with considerable organizational pressure to process arrests in custody and, in doing so, help their over-worked frontline colleagues who tirelessly bounced from one response call to another. This chapter aims to answer the question emerging from the last chapter: how did custody officers respond to the pressure they faced to authorize the detention of suspects, especially where the arrest seemed to be on dubious grounds? Did they succumb to workplace demands and authorize detention, or did they feel able to push back and challenge arresting officers and their supervisors? By the end of this chapter, the reader will come to understand how and, more importantly, why, the former attitude prevailed and what this tells us about custody officers as human rights practitioners.

Police functions of magistrates in the legislation of the Russian Empire of the 18th century

Based on the analysis of normative legal acts regulating the activities of magistrates in the cities of the Russian Empire, the article identifies, summarizes and describes the police functions of magistrates performed by them along with administrative, judicial, fiscal and other functions, and also shows the role of city self-government bodies in the formation and development of police in the cities of the Russian Empire of the XVIII century.

The role and place of the General police in the system of local government of Siberia (the XVIII — beginning of XX century)

In the monograph developed by the scientific concept of local control of Siberia of XVIII — early XX century, according to which the military and administrative powers of the provincial government was transformed in the XVIII century in the administrative and police functions established within the framework of the Imperial legislation and implemented by the governors with extensive and specialized police apparatus. The original proposed judgment on the fact that the police from the time of its creation in the XVIII century, played a leading role in the system of local government of Siberia, in fact realizing the functions of the local administration. For researchers and teachers, masters and bachelors, as well as anyone interested in the history of the police and local administration.

ON PUTIN'S LONG STATE(reflections on the article of Vladislav Surkov)

The author, analyzing the article by V. Surkov Putins Lasting State, expresses either agreement with a part of his theses, substantiating it, doubting or denying and also briefly justifying them. Agreement with the theses: illusion of choice, realism of predestination, logic of the historical process, state of a new type, uniqueness and viability of Russia, model of the state, ideology of Putinism, people, the military and police functions are the most important and decisive. Doubts, denial: impossible, unnatural, counterhistorical disintegration of Russia, growing Russia, survival of the Russian nation, the absence of mention of the First President of the Russian Federation, which laid the foundation of the new Russia a significant export potential of the Russian political system, supreme ruler, understating the value of political institutions and the promotion of one person against this background, multilevel political institutions outlet clothing,trust in one person.

Living as One Liked

As Michel Foucault and his followers have amply demonstrated, modern liberal “government” in the broadest sense has ultimately been about producing a historically novel kind of subject, one who is equipped in body and mind to flourish as an individual in a modern capitalist environment and thereby contribute to the net well-being of all. In Athens, by contrast, it was taken for granted that subjects were already fully equipped to govern themselves. Thus, it was simply assumed that members of different households would not only secure their own domestic well-being but also collaborate with others more or less spontaneously to perform many other essential life-sustaining functions for the polis as a whole, whether acting as constituents of formal corporations, like demes and phratries, or simpy co-operating with one another as friends, relatives, neighbors, and fellow-Athenians. Hence, innumerable ecologically critical ritual actions were performed by descent-based corporations like gene, orgeones, demes, and phratries. Likewise, the vital responsibility of determining whether or not 18-year-old males were to be full members of the polis was assumed primarily by demes and phratries. No less important, the primary responsibility for determining whether or not marriages in Attica were legitimate was essentially left to friends, relatives, and neighbors. And most if not all “police” functions were performed by “civilians,” male and female, acting in concert and guided by established laws and customs.

Repression

Focuses on the German anti-guerrilla warfare in Serbia in 1941. Although German military and civil officials did not consider the Serbs as ideological enemies solely on the basis of race, the outbreak of resistance elevated racial stereotypes to the forestage of occupation policies, particularly since the Germans did not have enough troops to suppress the resistance. In comparison to Poland or Ukraine, where maintaining security was the prerogative of Himmler’s SS and police, his forces in Serbia were too small for such a task. As a result, it was the Wehrmacht, which assumed the essentially police functions. The German officer corps’ commitment to the Nazi ideology ensured that it perceived its task through political prism and applied unrestricted terror as the most effective method for crushing the resistance.