Police College Investigative Skills PDF

Police College INV06 INV06 has exactly the same elements as burglary plus the additional element that at the time of committing the offence, the accused person possessed one or more of the articles listed below: W weap...

Police College INV06 INV06 has exactly the same elements as burglary plus the additional element that at the time of committing the offence, the accused person possessed one or more of the articles listed below: W weapon of offence I imitation firearm F firearm E explosive Weapon of offence - The same as offensive weapon - any article made, adapted or intended for use for causing injury to a person, BUT weapon of offence also includes articles made, adapted or intended for use in incapacitating a person. Imitation firearm - Toy guns, replicas and anything that has the appearance of being a firearm. Firearm - Weapons such as shotguns, airguns, air pistols. This offence does not include references to component parts or accessories. Explosive - Gelignite, grenades, thunder flashes, fireworks etc. and any article for the purpose of producing a practical effect by explosion, or intended by the person having it with him for that purpose. Has with him – ‘Knowingly’ having possession at the time of committing the burglary. If one or two persons commit the burglary and one of them has physical possession of a prohibited article (e.g. a gun) then all who knew of the article are guilty of aggravated burglary. When the article is a ‘weapon of offence’, (e.g. a penknife), which has become such only because the person having it with him intends to use it to cause injury, then his co- defendant must in addition to knowing of the article, also either know of the co-accused’s intentions or have that intention himself. OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 65  Police College INV06 INV06 Mode of Trial/Penalty On indictment only – life imprisonment. It has now been widely recognised that victims of all crime and in particular burglary, can suffer considerable trauma following an incident in their home. It should be remembered by the investigating officer that victims should be dealt with in a professional and caring manner as most victims of burglary can find great difficulty in adjusting - particularly elderly and vulnerable people who reside alone. OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 66  INV05 INV05 Police College Investigative Skills Theft Introduction Theft is a so-called ‘volume crime’. Of all the dishonest criminal offences you will deal with, theft will probably be the most common. The primary source of legislation relating to theft is to be found in Section 1-6 of the Theft Act (NI) 1969 (mandatory reading and examinable) which can be found on Classis. The information here is therefore relevant when conducting initial investigations and reporting of crime, according to the national/ local policing plans. You are likely to encounter theft early on in your career as a probationer police officer. Offences of theft include shoplifting and stealing from a friend, stranger or employer, as well as a number of other similar crimes. There are many legal complexities surrounding theft and we will examine the basic principles involved. However, it is worth clarifying at this point two particular examples of theft that occur commonly and are looked at separately in your course. These are: Robbery (theft from a person, accompanied by violence or the threat of violence). Burglary (theft or the intention of theft from a building). Section 1 of the Theft Act (NI) 1969 states, “a person is guilty of theft if he/she dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it”. OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 51  Police College INV06 INV06 Investigative Skills Burglary Introduction Offences against property and persons are generally regarded as more serious if the criminal entered premises where they had no right to be, in order to commit the crime. You may have to deal with an offence of burglary early in your policing career, so it is therefore essential that you are able to recognise the offence in order that you can effectively take the appropriate action. As you will see the main difference between 9(1)(a) and 9(1)(b) is that 9(1) (a) only requires an intention to commit one of the three listed offences; 9(1) (b) is the actual committing or attempt to commit one of the two listed offences. Definition - Burglary Steal anything in the building or part of the building, or Inflict on any person therein any grievous bodily harm, or Section 9(1) (a) Theft (NI) Act 1969 Having entered any building or part of a building as a trespasser, he Section 9(1)(b) Theft (NI) Act 1969 OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 58  Police College INV06 INV06 As with theft there are elements within the definition, which need to be proven to establish whether burglary has taken place. Enters This has not been defined by the Act and it is therefore for the courts to decide. However the police should prove an ‘effective’ entry. While the majority of cases will involve the complete entry of the person this does not have to be the case. The person who inserts their hand after breaking the window with the intent of carrying out one of the listed offences has also entered. The entry of an innocent agent or an instrument held in the offender’s hand for the purpose of intimidating any person or stealing or damaging any property therein will also be sufficient to commit the offence. However, if the instrument is only used to make or facilitate entry to the premises the full offence of burglary has not taken place. 1. Has Hull entered? 2. Hull breaks a window and climbs through and enters the building with his whole body. YES 3. Hull breaks a window and puts his hand in to steal goods in shop window YES 4. Hull pushes coat hanger through a letter box in an attempt to hook clothing on a rail inside the shop YES 5. Hull pushes a coat hanger through small top window to attempt to hook the latch of a lower, larger window in an attempt to open it NO 6. Hull puts his arm through a small window to open a latch on a larger window YES While in the majority of cases of burglary entry will be gained by the whole of the body OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 59  Police College INV06 INV06 encroaching the building or part of a building, as the case may be, an offence may still be revealed where the physical entry is limited, e.g. the man who inserts his hand into the letterbox of an office intending to steal, or the ‘smash and grab’, offender who puts his arm through the shop window with similar intent. Building Generally, the term building can be easily understood to be a building. The place must have some degree of permanence however; vehicles and vessels in use as dwellings are buildings. When a vehicle or vessel is used for this purpose, it will remain a building even when occupiers are temporarily away. When it is no longer in use as a dwelling burglary cannot be committed in it. Caravans are the main type of portable structure that you will deal with. Uninhabited caravans are not buildings, temporarily uninhabited caravans may be, it depends on the circumstances. The term building never includes a tent, but it can include a portable structure which is intended to be permanent and has the main characteristics of a building except for foundations (i.e. walls and a roof). The view has also been taken that an unfinished house of which the walls, external and internal, has been built, the roof was on, a considerable part of the floor had been laid, etc., was held to be a building. Therefore in dealing with cases on sites where unfinished buildings are at various stages of completion, it will be for the court to decide which constitutes a building for the purposes of burglary. It follows that the prosecution must produce evidence as to the state of completion of such building at the time of the alleged offence. Case Law To illustrate how far the courts will extend the term “building”, the following may assist. The Criminal Law Revision Committee thought a tent was too open a structure to be naturally regarded as the subject of burglary, consider however cases involving freezer containers or other portable buildings. In the case of R v B and S Leathley (1979) goods were stolen from a freezer container in OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 60  Police College INV06 INV06 a farmyard, the only question for the court was whether such was a building within the terms outlined in the Theft Act. The defence argued that it was a piece of industrial plant, which could be removed at any time; it rested on railway sleepers and was without permanent or purpose – built foundations and therefore not a building. The court however found that it was a building relying on the following points of fact: a. The container was 25 feet long with 7 feet square cross-section, weighed about three tons and had been in position for 2 to 3 years. b. The owner intended to leave it there for the foreseeable future. It was therefore ‘a structure of considerable time’; c. Its doors were equipped with locks to keep trespassers out; and d. It was connected to an outside source of electricity. Part of a building This is included to cover a situation where, in the same building, a person may have a right to be in one place, but not in another. Example An open plan shop with a central, enclosed till area. People have permission to be in the main part of the shop, but anyone entering the till area without permission would be a trespasser. A no-entry sign or a rope could mark off one part of a building from another. R v Walkington (1979). Example A tenant of a block of flats has a pass – key that provides access to a communal foyer of the block of flats. He uses the pass-key to enter the foyer (entering a building and plainly not a trespasser at this stage). Instead of entering his own flat he forces entry to a neighbour’s flat by breaking down the neighbour’s door that can be accessed via the communal foyer (moving from one part of the building to another in the process and certainly a trespasser at this stage). OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 61  Police College INV06 INV06 Trespasser This means being there without the consent of a person who can give such consent, or without other lawful authority. This is fairly straightforward. However, a possibility which may be new to you is where a person gains consent to enter premises by deception; in other words, there is no true consent then they are a trespasser. For example, where a person gains entry to a house by pretending to be an official wishing to read a meter, but actually intending to steal. In these circumstances the person is a trespasser. Example Bingham enters a shop to make a complaint to the management. There is no one around, so he enters the manager’s office through a door which states “Private Staff Only“. A heated argument develops and Bingham hits the manager breaking his jaw (burglary, as Bingham was a trespasser). If however Bingham had been invited into the office and then struck the manager breaking his jaw (no burglary, as there is no trespass). As already stated, to sustain a charge of burglary there must be an entry, the next element takes this a step further by saying that the entry must be made by a trespasser. For the purposes of burglary such an entry must be accompanied by mens rea (guilty mind). The defendant must know or be reckless as to the facts which make the entry a trespass. A point to note is that a person may be welcome in one part of a building yet for the purposes of burglary not welcome in another part of the building. Section (9)(1)(a) - Intent ‘at time’ of entry With regard to the intent required for Section 9(1)(a), this requires the accused to have an intention as they enter to commit any of the specified offences. The best evidence is to show the accused has actually carried out the offence but where the offence was not completed or could not be completed the prosecution will have to show evidence of the OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 62  Police College INV06 INV06 intent. The intentions must be as follows: Intent to steal – This means an intention to commit theft under Section 1 of the Theft Act. The property which the defendant intends to steal must be in a building or part of a building. Intent to inflict grievous bodily harm – The offence in question in respect of a burglary under 9(1)(a) is of grievous bodily harm contrary to Section 18 of the Offences against the Persons Act 1861. Causing unlawful damage – This includes damage, not only to the building but to anything in it. Conditional intent – Provided the required intention can be proved, it is immaterial whether or not there is anything ‘worth stealing’ within the building. R v Walkington (1979). The same will be true if the person whom the defendant intends to cause serious harm to is not in the building or part of the building at the time. Section (9)(1)(b) We will now look at Section (9)(1)(b) which states: A person is guilty of burglary if: Having entered any building as a trespasser,  he steals or attempts to steal anything in the building or that part of it or  Inflicts to attempts to inflict on any person therein any grievous harm. The second type of burglary involves a defendant’s behaviour after entering the building or part of a building as a trespasser. The defendant must have entered the building or part of the building as a trespasser; It is not enough that they subsequently became a trespasser by exceeding a condition of entry (e.g. hiding in the public area of a shop during open hours until the shop closes). However, where a person has entered a particular building (such as a shop or pub) lawfully and without trespassing, if they later move to OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 63  Police College INV06 INV06 another part of the building as a trespasser, this element of the offence will be made out. Unlike (9)(1)(a), there are only two further elements to the offence under Section (9)(1)(b) – the subsequent theft / attempted theft of anything in the building or part of it, and the subsequent inflicting/ attempting to inflict of grievous bodily harm contrary to Sections 18 or 20 of the Offences Against the Persons Act 1861. It has been suggested that if, having entered as a trespasser a building or part of a building, the defendant commits an offence of criminal damage, then this will be an offence under (9) (1)(b) of the Act as to damage or destroy something is also to steal it. This is not the case. If a person enters in such circumstances and causes criminal damage, there is little argument that such an activity would satisfy part of the offence of theft, i.e. appropriating property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it – but where is the dishonesty? In addition, this would clearly be an unwarranted extension of the burglary offence under Section (9)(1)(b) of the Theft Act 1969. If Parliament wanted such activity to be caught by the legislation, they would have included the offence of criminal damage within the definition of burglary under Section (9)(1)(b). Mode of Trial/Penalty A person is guilty of burglary shall on conviction on indictment be liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding – a. Where the offence was committed in respect of a building or part of a building which is a dwelling, 14 years. b. In any other case, 10 years. Aggravated Burglary Section 10 (1) Theft Act 1969 A person is guilty of aggravated burglary if he commits any burglary and at the time has with him any firearm, imitation firearm, any weapon of offence or any explosive. The difference between burglary and aggravated burglary is simple. Aggravated burglary OFFICIAL [SENSITIVE] Page 64