Nandor: Boy racer blitz a "snow job"
Green MP Nandor Tanczos today criticised a police suggestion in today's New Zealand Herald that they would execute
search warrants to seize cars weeks after any offences occurred.
"This is exactly the kind of abuse of process that the Green Party warned about when opposing the new legislation," said
Nandor.
"It allows the police to completely circumvent the court system by turning up on someone's doorstep and taking their car
because they might have committed an offence weeks ago. They don't have to prove anything to anyone."
"The police can enter your property and impose a punishment on you, without a trial or an opportunity to defend
yourself. If you don't like it you can appeal - to the police!
"The immediate impounding of cars could be argued to remove an immediate danger from our roads. This action doesn't even
do that. It is even more important that delayed action has to go through a court process.
"Right now, the police don't even need to prove you were in the vicinity of an offence.
"It is totally contrary to the principle of justice that says you are innocent until proven guilty."
Nandor said the boy racer crackdown was a public relations "snow job", with indications that the police were picking on
the wrong, but easy, targets.
"More than 100 police officers in the wider Auckland region alone were involved in a weekend blitz that mostly netted a
bunch of learner drivers in breach of their license conditions.
"Is this the Government's idea of making our roads safer?"