Obviously this is not “wrongly imprisoned” based on your personal opinion, you felonious scallywag, but rather your case would be judged against a set of criteria surrounding when it happened and the bail conditions.
Basically the NSW Police database, known as COPS (Computer Operational Policing System)(-____-), done fucked up. As a result and as per the SMH report, “scores of young people across the state” were “wrongfully arrested, imprisoned and in some cases strip-searched.”
They have since found up to 100 claimants and have reached a settlement of at least $1.85 million.
In a statement Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC), outlined the case they spearheaded:
“The problem stems from inaccurate or out of date information on the computer system known as COPS. For several years, PIAC has been urging the NSW Government to fix COPS.One of PIAC’s clients was arrested, handcuffed and strip-searched on three separate occasions over a two-week period. He was held in custody overnight on each occasion. Even though he was 14 at the time, NSW Police did not contact his mother. The bail conditions he was arrested for allegedly breaching did not exist at the time of the arrests, but showed up as current on COPS.”
The class action is open to people whose matters have been heard before the Children’s Court of New South Wales, who were arrested by police before the 20th of May 2014 for breach of bail conditions when they shouldn’t have been.
Head HERE to get more info and find out if you’re eligible.
Title image by Paul Miller via Getty via Photoshop.
