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If you’ve ever sworn you weren’t as drunk as the bouncer said when he kicked you out, you might be able to take it to court.
A man removed from a Parramatta pub after allegedly only being a couple of sips deep into his second VB of the night has been awarded $20,000 by the courts.
Johnny Raad was at the Albion Hotel with his wife Ann in June 2012 when he was asked to leave for being “intoxicated” and when he complained to police that he’d been assaulted by one security guard while another walked “menacingly” towards him, he was issued a ticket for not leaving the hotel.
The saga continued when Mr Raad appeared to be walking in the direction of the hotel and police handcuffed the 46-year-old before shoving him into a police van to take him to Parramatta station where he spent two hours.
This is where the issue lied for District Court judge Matthew Dicker – not so much the ejection from the premises. He found the scenario amounted to unlawful arrest as the police had no intention to charge him with an offence.
“A person cannot be arrested merely to prevent the continuation of offence if the police do not intend to charge the arrested person with the offence,” Judge Dicker said.
Loitering near the premises after being asked to leave is not punishable by imprisonment and the use of multiple police officers to get Mr Raad in the van when he wasn’t resisting them “in any way” was deemed to be “excessive force” by Judge Dicker.
Although the judgement found no evidence Mr Raad had more than one drink, Judge Dicker rejected his claim of malicious prosecution as he felt the arrest was “not undertaken with malice” but brought with “reasonable and probable cause”.
He did however find Mr Raad’s evidence to be “honest” and awarded him $20,000 for false imprisonment.
“The freedom of a member of the public is important and arrests must take place for valid and lawful reasons,” Judge Dicker said.
But keep in mind if you’ve had a few raspberries, it probably is you that’s the problem.
