State of NSW v Corbett - [2007] HCATrans 119

[2007] HCATrans 119

IN THE HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Office of the Registry
Sydney No S2 of 2007

B e t w e e n -
STATE OF NEW SOUTH WALES
Appellant
and
JAMES JOHN CORBETT
First Respondent
ROBYN JEAN CORBETT
Second Respondent

GLEESON CJ
GUMMOW J
KIRBY J
CALLINAN J
CRENNAN J

TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS

AT CANBERRA ON WEDNESDAY, 21 MARCH 2007, AT 10.21 AM

MR M.G. SEXTON, SC, Solicitor‑General for the State of New South Wales: If the Court pleases, I appear with my learned friends, MR M.J. NEIL, QC and MR P.R. STERNBERG, for the appellant. (instructed by Crown Solicitor for New South Wales)

MR J.M. IRELAND, QC: May it please the Court, I appear with my learned friends, MR S.G. MOFFET and MR J.S. COOKE, on behalf of the respondents. (instructed by Moloney Lawyers)

GLEESON CJ: Yes, Mr Solicitor.

MR SEXTON: Your Honours, if the Court pleases, these proceedings arise out of a police search of the plaintiff’s property at Goulburn on 4 June 1998. The New South Wales Court of Appeal found that the warrant was invalid because of what the members of the court considered to be a defect in the application for the warrant which was made on the previous day, 3 June 1998.

I need to take your Honours to a number of pieces of relevant legislation but before doing that, can I simply in two or three sentences baldly state what our argument will be, and it is this; that in making the application the police officer in question swore that he had reasonable grounds to believe that the things to be searched for were connected with a firearms offence, and he specified a particular provision of the Firearms Act 1989. That Act had been repealed at that time and replaced by the Firearms Act 1996. This misdescription was the defect identified by the Court of Appeal.

GUMMOW J: The question is, was it a defect? Literally, section 12A of the Search Warrants Act as it then stood, if you pick it up and track it through the regulations to which it refers and back to the definition as it then was of “firearms offence”, was still speaking to the old statute, was it not?

MR SEXTON: What we say, your Honour, is because there was an essentially similar provision ‑ ‑ ‑

GUMMOW J: No, what I am coming to is, what could have been done conformably with section 12A other than what was done? So therefore, I wonder, where was there any defect?

MR SEXTON: We say there was not a defect, your Honour, that is so. In a sense to deal with what the Court of Appeal said, we say that because there was an essentially similar provision in the later Act that there was no defect in the application such as would lead to the warrant being invalidated and if there was a defect we say…

Grounds of appeal

[14] The appellant contends that the primary judge erred in finding that the respondent had discharged the onus of establishing the matters required under the relevant provision.

[15] It was submitted that his Honour failed to give adequate weight to the evidence of the second witness, and that the findings of fact were not reasonably open on the material before the Court.

[16] The respondent, for its part, submits that no error is disclosed, and that the conclusions reached were well within the range of outcomes available to the primary judge.

Consideration

[17] It is convenient to deal first with the question of construction, as the resolution of that issue informs the remaining grounds advanced by the appellant.

[18] For the reasons that follow, we are of the view that the appeal should be allowed in part and the matter remitted for further determination.

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Details

Case: [2007] HCATrans 119
Decision Date: 21 March 2007

CaseChat Overview and Summary

The case of *State of NSW v Corbett* concerned an appeal to the High Court of Australia by the State of New South Wales against a decision of the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of New South Wales. The dispute arose from proceedings brought by Mr Corbett, who alleged that he had been unlawfully detained by police. The core of the matter involved the validity of a search warrant and the subsequent arrest and detention of Mr Corbett.

The High Court was required to determine whether the search warrant issued for Mr Corbett's premises was validly issued, and consequently, whether the arrest and detention of Mr Corbett were lawful. This involved an examination of the provisions of the *Crimes Act 1900* (NSW) relating to search warrants and the powers of police officers in relation to arrest and detention. The Court also considered the principles of statutory interpretation in relation to these provisions.

The Court's reasoning focused on the requirements for the issuance of a search warrant under the relevant legislation, particularly the need for reasonable grounds to believe that an indictable offence had been committed and that evidence of that offence would be found at the premises. The judges analysed the evidence before the issuing officer and concluded that the grounds for issuing the warrant were insufficient, rendering the warrant invalid. As a consequence of the invalid warrant, the subsequent arrest and detention of Mr Corbett were also found to be unlawful. The Court applied established principles regarding the necessity for lawful authority for detention and the consequences of unlawful detention.

Orders