Hearing:	25 and 26 August 2014
Court:	Elias CJ, McGrath, William Young, Glazebrook and Arnold JJ
Counsel:	P J Davison QC, W Akel and H D L Steele for First Appellant F Pilditch for Second Appellant G J S R Foley and L F Stringer for Third and Fourth Appellants D J Boldt, F R J Sinclair and M H Cooke for Respondent
Judgment:	23 December 2014

JUDGMENT OF THE COURT

A The appeal is dismissed.
B The appellants are jointly and severally liable to pay costs of [$35,000] to the respondent.

____________________________________________________________________

REASONS

Para No
Elias CJ,	[1]
McGrath, William Young, Glazebrook and Arnold JJ	[68]

ELIAS CJ

In issue in the appeal is the validity of search warrants granted by the District Court at Auckland on 19 January 2012 under the provisions of the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act 1992. The Police had been authorised to apply for the warrants by the Attorney-General following a request by the United States of America.
Before authorising the Police to seek warrants, the Attorney-General was required by the legislation to be satisfied that there were reasonable grounds for believing that in the premises identified in the warrant application there would be evidence in respect of offences alleged to have been committed in the United States punishable by imprisonment for a term of 2 years or more.[1] No issue arises as to whether this condition was met.
[1]Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act 1992, s 43.
Rather, it is claimed that the warrants as issued by the District Court were invalid because substantively defective. The defects in the particularity with which the offences and the material authorised to be seized were identified are said to make the warrants general warrants which are bad in law. They authorised search and seizure of material likely to include that which was irrelevant and private. No conditions such as might have permitted the court to supervise sorting for relevance were imposed.
The Attorney-General acknowledges deficiencies in the warrants but says they are not such as to make the warrants general and invalid. He maintains that the deficiencies are technical ones giving rise to no miscarriage of justice in the circumstances (including the other information available to the appellants at the time the warrants were executed).
On that basis, the Attorney-General says that the Court is obliged by s 204 of the Summary Proceedings Act 1957 to treat the warrants as valid. Section 204 is a provision of general application to criminal processes. The section, as then applicable,[2] provided:
204 Proceedings not to be questioned for want of form
No information, complaint, summons, conviction, sentence, order, bond, warrant, or other document, and no process or proceeding shall be quashed,…

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.

Continue reading Dotcom v Attorney-General

Details

AGLC: Dotcom v Attorney-General [2014] NZSC 199
Case: [2014] NZSC 199
Decision Date: 23 December 2014

CaseChat Overview and Summary

This appeal concerns the validity of search warrants issued under the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act 1992. The warrants were issued in relation to offences alleged to have been committed in the United States of America, and the respondents sought judicial review of the warrants. The High Court found that the warrants were invalid, but the Court of Appeal overturned that decision. The respondents appealed to the Supreme Court. The Court dismissed the appeal and upheld the Court of Appeal's decision, holding that the warrants were not general warrants. The Court accepted that the warrants were overbroad and did not identify the offences or the items to be seized with sufficient particularity. However, the Court found that the defects in the warrants were not so serious as to render them invalid. The Court held that the warrants fell within the saving provision of section 204 of the Summary Proceedings Act 1957.

Orders