Adjudication No. 1439 (adjudicated September 2009) [2009] APC 26

Adjudication No. 1439 (adjudicated September 2009)

The Australian Press Council has dismissed a complaint from Gatty Burnett over an article published in the Tasmanian daily, The Advocate, on August 13, 2009.

The article reported that police internal investigations are looking into a complaint by Shannon Blake into his detention, and treatment once detained, by police in the early hours of August 9, 2009. The complainant is an acquaintance of Mr Blake and was with him when the police action occurred in a Devonport street.

In the article the newspaper claimed that Blake had been "arrested". The complainant claims that Blake was never arrested. She claims that he was never told he was under arrest and that for the newspaper to claim that he was arrested was "slanderous propaganda".

The complainant states that Blake was forcibly taken into police custody and that he was held for a number of hours. It is claimed, for example, that capsicum spray was used on him. The complainant asserts Blake was repeatedly assaulted while in custody. He was released without charge.

In dismissing the complaint, the Council takes the view that the newspaper cannot be criticised for the use of the word "arrested", as that appears to be what happened to Blake. An arrest can be understood as the detention of an individual by the police.

The Council cannot comment on the complainant's suggestion that Blake was never told he was being arrested. That may, or may not, be relevant in the police internal investigation. Whether the police acted properly in the act of detaining him, and while holding him in custody, are also matters for others to decide. Irrespective of that, the newspaper's use of the term "arrested" in the article does not breach any of the Council's principles.