John Munro: Thousands of formal warnings scrapped due to unlawful issuance

Thousands of Police issued 'formal warnings' have been scrapped after findings that 63% were issued unlawfully. 

'Formal warnings' are used as alternatives to prosecutions where the offence is deemed unworthy of going through the courts. 

Last week, Police told all staff that compulsory training will be rolled out and an updated policy for formal warnings would be issued by the end of the year.

Defence lawyer John Munroe joined Heather du Plessis-Allan to chat about how this happened, and what it means. 

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Unfortunately, the hitsdouky coming from police for police. It's now
been revealed that thousands of formal warnings are said to
be white from police records because officers haven't followed proper
protocol for years now. Formal warnings are basically used to
avoid going to court, but there is a record. John
Monroe's a defense lawyer and with us Morning, John, Good morning.
Are you surprised to hear that as many as sixty
seven percent of these maybe no non compliant and may

(00:21):
have to be wiped?

Speaker 2 (00:23):
I'm very surprised. Why surprised? Well, it's a pretty simple process.
It's similar workin to the diversion process, which we already
have as well. But it's simply taking an allegation to
a person and making it sure they accept it before
and accept responsibility for it, before they've give them a warning.

(00:45):
And it sounds to me that that's what hasn't been done.
I'm not entirely sure, but by reading between the lines,
I think that's what's been done incorrectly, is that they
haven't got acceptance from all of these people our prior
to giving them a formal warning.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
How many do you think might been issued here? I mean,
I know, we know it's thousands, but thousands is a
very big range.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Look, it's it's it's a difficult one to put a
figure on it, but it's it's a very common practice
and which has been ongoing for some time, similar to
the diversion scheme, and a lot of low order offenses
are dealt with in this way so they don't have
to go through and clog up the courts.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
What's your advice to people if they get if the
cops say to them they might give them the formal warning, resist.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
No, No, It really depends on the situation. But if
if you have had a situation where they're giving you
a formal warning and you accept it, much like diversion,
then I tell them to accept it and it's much
better than going through the court system and having a
conviction on your record. But of course I've had situations
also where the police want to give them a warning

(01:50):
and say look, it's it's all fine, it all go away,
and you'll get a warning, but they don't accept responsibility,
and I say, no, we're not going to accept it
and take it through the court so we can prove
his innocence and show that he's innocent or go away basically.

Speaker 1 (02:06):
John, thanks very much, really appreciate it. As John Munroe
defense lawyer. We'll talk to the Prime Minister who's going
to be with us in about twenty minutes or so.
About that.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen live to
news talks. It'd be from six am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.