Power to search persons for dangerous implements without warrant in public places and schools
23 Power to search persons for dangerous implements without warrant in public places and schools
A police officer may, without a warrant, stop, search and detain a person who is in a public place or a school, and anything in the possession of or under the control of the person, if the police officer suspects on reasonable grounds that the person has a dangerous implement unlawfully in the person’s possession or under the person’s control.
To avoid doubt, if the person is in a school and is a student at the school, the police officer may also search the person’s locker at the school and examine any bag or other personal effect that is inside the locker.
For the purposes of this section, the fact that a person is present in a location with a high incidence of violent crime may be taken into account in determining whether there are reasonable grounds to suspect that the person has a dangerous implement in the person’s possession or under the person’s control.
In conducting a search of a student in a school under this section, a police officer must, if reasonably possible to do so, allow the student to nominate an adult who is on the school premises to be present during the search.
A police officer may seize and detain anything found as a result of a search under this section that the police officer has reasonable grounds to suspect is a dangerous implement that is unlawfully in the person’s possession or under the person’s control.
For the purposes of this section—
locker includes any facility for the storage of a student’s personal effects, and
anything inside a person’s locker is taken to be under the control of the person.
This Act’s bill:Explanatory memorandumSecond reading speech
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