In the past decade a gun culture has descended on the streets of Sydney. The criminal fraternity is matching the police in firearms posession and a network of crime at customs and on the waterfront make it impossible to stop the inward flow of new weapons.
One of the requirements that hinder police is the necessity of obtaining a " search order " before raiding premises to look for weapons. The police must first get a judge to sign off on that order, and produce " evidence " to substantiate its necesssity.
Criminals diversify their tactics as police tactics start to " bite " ! We are now seeing guns stashed away in " safe houses " and even hidden in supposedly abandoned vehicles left in city streets. The gun culture is alive and well - as illustrated by the amost daily shootings that occur on the crime scene.
The state government is proposing a law change to make it easier for the police to harass this gun culture. The present law allows police to search any place or person subject to an order forbidding them to posess guns - without the need for a " search order ". The only person allowed to issue such a decree is the Police Commissioner and there are just sixty-four such orders current in this state.
This law change would extend that power to any commissioned officer above the rank of Inspector. We could therefore expect a huge increase in the numbers of those forbidden to have a gun in their posession - and a consequent drop in the need to obtain a search order before a police raid.
Some in the legal fraternity will see this as an end run around a law intended to protect the public from mandatory police searches. It is yet to be explained what procedures will be in place to justify the issuring of those " no gun posession " orders and what onus of proof will be firstly required.
The civil liberties people will no doubt feel uncomfortable with evidence of other crime collected in these gun searches. They could easily become " fishing expeditions ". That requirement to have a judge sign off on a search order was to safeguard the public from police excess. It's removal opens up a whole new " ball game " !
The legislature needs to move carefully on considering this new power. There is no doubt that the crime scene has worsened in recent times and the law has to change to accommodate a gun culture, but it would be too easy for the pendulum to swing too far in the opposite direction - and we end up living in a " police state " !
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