NSW Should We All be Scared of Police Powers?

They must investigate any complaint made to them and lay charges if there is sufficient evidence to suggest a prosecution is possible.

Scared of the powers?
No.

Impatient with the few sloppy, and/or incompetent, and/or lazy police
who tarnish the good name of the rest of them?
Sure.

There is no definition - what is sufficient evidence is up to a court of law to determine and is one of their primary functions. The police will determine whether they think it is sufficient to make the allegation before a court. There is no 'one size fits all', it is entirely situational.

factstory??? said:

Thanks for info. I feel it's obviously unjust for Police or public prosecutor to have discretionary power to decide whether evidence is sufficient or not to make a charge. Whilst the law is unwilling to define in law what is reasonable evidence and leave it to police willful or mistakes will be made to destroy reputations n livelihoods of innocent people. In high profile sensational cases the defendant is already judged n sentenced even before the case goes to court as you may know. I think sufficient evidence should be legally defined n should be substantial so less chance of a jury getting it wrong.
So if Police can arrest you at their discretion any time they think they have sufficient evidence n U r found not guilty is that false arrest? Do you get compensation for being wrongly accused???

Click to expand...

I am not sure if the ‘evidence act’ or ‘evidence regulations’ might provide you with some information regarding your query.
I agree with you completely that it is far too easy and not far fetched at all that somebody could be targeted by the very people who are supposed to be protecting and serving us. It takes making a hell of a lot of noise in a situation where the powers that be control your existence. Police corruption, it exists today and always will for as long as police are human and not robots! It exists within many local police stations through Australia and the world.. Its the bullies in the playground mentality. And is so much more noticeable in larger regional towns as opposed to major cities.
I’m only able to speak of my own observations that I’ve been able to make due to much time spent with them in my past.!

If @factstory??? gives us the back story to their original question,
we might be able to make some more meaningful commentary.
Or perhaps even point them to posts where a similar questions
have been dealt with before.

In the meantime...

All police need to arrest a person is a "reasonable suspicion".
Ordinary police don't decide actual guilt or otherwise.
But they can decide whether or not to charge a given person with a given offence.

Police do not always have much discretion in taking out
(what in NSW we call) an AVO.
Sometimes, doing so is standard police procedure
(pretty much no matter what the PINOP thinks or wants).

By contrast, the Crown (no matter a Police Prosecutor or the DPP)
needs to prove a case beyond reasonable doubt.
That's actually quite a high threshold, and requires highly reliable evidence.
Rather more and better evidence than mere suspicion, an unsupported allegation,
or an emphatic belief.