Jarratt v Commissioner of Police NSW & Anor

The case of *Jarratt v Commissioner of Police NSW & Anor* concerned a dispute between the appellant, Mr Jarratt, and the respondents, the Commissioner of Police NSW and another. The matter came before the High Court of Australia.

The central legal issue before the High Court was whether the Commissioner of Police owed a duty of care to Mr Jarratt, a police informant, to take reasonable steps to protect him from harm arising from his cooperation with the police. This involved considering the scope of the duty of care owed by the police to informants and the circumstances under which such a duty might arise.

The High Court, comprising McHugh and Callinan JJ, determined that the Commissioner of Police did not owe Mr Jarratt a duty of care in the circumstances of this case. Their Honours reasoned that while the police have a general duty to the public, this does not extend to assuming a personal duty of care to protect individual informants from all foreseeable harm. The court distinguished between the general duty to enforce the law and a specific duty to protect an individual, finding that the latter was not established on the facts. The court considered that the relationship between the police and an informant did not, of itself, create a duty to protect the informant from harm that might arise from the informant's own criminal activities or associations.

The appeal was dismissed.