Youth Court Decisions How to Use Full list of key titles CYPFA section Date

Police v W (1990) 6 FRNZ 711 (HC)

Case summary provided by BROOKERS

Name: Police v W
Reported: (1990) 6 FRNZ 711
File number: AP185/89
Date: 24 September 1990
Court: High Court
Location: Auckland
Judge: Gault J
Charge: Incest
CYPF no: s2
Key Title: Jurisdiction of the Youth Court - Age
Brooker’s Summary:

Children and young persons - Statutory interpretation - Jurisdiction - Accused, aged 29, charged with offence allegedly committed when a young person - Relevant date for calculating age was date of offence and not date when proceedings were contemplated or taken - District Court had no jurisdiction to hear case - Informations correctly dismissed - Children and Young Persons Act 1974, s 2(1) and (2).

In 1988, the respondent, then aged 29, was charged with committing incest with his two sisters when he was 16 years old. Although the District Court Judge found the charges proved, she dismissed the informations on the basis that the Court did not have jurisdiction to hear the informations because the respondent was a "young person" at the time of the offences (s 2(1) and (2) Children and Young Persons Act 1974). The essential issue in this appeal by way of case stated was whether the relevant date for calculating the age of a person was the date of the offence or the date when proceedings were contemplated or taken (s 2(2)).

NB: Although the case came before the Court under the 1974 Act, the appeal is not just of academic interest, because the new Children, Young Persons, and Their Families Act 1989 is the same in all respects for the purpose of determining jurisdiction.

Held, the proper interpretation of s 2(2) is that the age of the respondent is to be taken as at the date of the alleged offence. Parliament would not have intended that a question of jurisdiction between any Court should depend on the time when a person first "contemplated" a thing or matter. Questions of jurisdiction must be clear and unambiguous. Accordingly, s 34 applies to confer exclusive jurisdiction on the Children and Young Persons Court where a young person is charged with a summary offence, or indictable offence punishable summarily. The District Court Judge was clearly right to dismiss the informations having found that she had no jurisdiction and in the absence of any power to remit proceedings from the District Court to the Children and Young Persons Court.

Obiter, as a matter of principle, the District Court should not determine guilt if it does not have the jurisdiction to enter into the legal inquiry, especially in a case like the present where the offences alleged are of such a serious nature.

Cases referred to

Griffiths v Winikeri (1989) 4 CRNZ 313
Police v W [1941] 2 MCR 85[(1990) 6 FRNZ 711, 712]Powierza v MOT 20/2/84, Thorp J, HC Auckland M1673/83
R v M [1986] 2 NZLR 172

Appeal

This was an appeal by way of case stated on a question of law.

The facts appear from the judgment.