R v Yeh

The Court of Appeal of New Zealand heard an appeal by the Crown against a pre-trial ruling by Courtney J, which had ruled evidence obtained from three searches conducted on 11 February 2006 inadmissible. The searches occurred as a result of police officers conducting licensing checks in the vicinity of the Auckland Casino, where they observed a white Mitsubishi vehicle double-parked on Federal Street. The Crown argued that there were reasonable grounds for the police to believe there were drugs in the vehicle, which justified the search, and that the subsequent searches of an apartment were lawful. The respondents argued that the searches were unlawful and the evidence obtained should be excluded.

The Court of Appeal found that the combination of factors identified by the Crown was sufficient to give reasonable grounds to believe there were illegal drugs in the vehicle. The Court held that the evidence obtained from the search of the car was admissible. However, the Court found that the entry into Shed 19 and the subsequent search of the apartment were unlawful and the evidence obtained from these searches was inadmissible. The Court held that the exclusion of the evidence was not disproportionate to the breaches.

The final orders were that the Crown's application for leave to appeal was granted, the appeal was allowed in relation to the search of the car, and the evidence was admissible. The appeal was dismissed in relation to the search of Mr Ren and the apartment, and the evidence obtained from those searches was inadmissible. An order was also made prohibiting publication of this judgment or the reasons therefor in news media or on the internet or in any other publicly accessible database until final disposition of trial. Publication in law report or law digest was permitted.