Connor & Ors v Chief Constable of Merseyside Police

A lawful warrant to search premises and persons for firearms carries a necessarily implied power to take reasonable and necessary steps to make the search safe and effective. That power may justify short-term restraint or detention of occupants, but its exercise depends on fact and degree and remains subject to close scrutiny for necessity and proportionality.

In false-imprisonment proceedings, once the relevant facts are established, the lawfulness of detention is for the judge. A bare allegation does not require a jury to consider malice or absence of reasonable and probable cause. Reliable intelligence of an imminent firearms risk may justify a proportionate search under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The appellants claimed damages for trespass, assault, false imprisonment and human-rights breaches after armed Merseyside police executed a warrant at Ms Garner’s home to search for firearms connected with gang violence. The warrant was obtained on intelligence from an informant whose earlier information had led to the recovery of firearms.

After a six-day jury trial, Liverpool County Court dismissed the claims. The jury found that the force used, including the pointing of firearms where established and the handcuffing of the adult appellants, was reasonable. The judge withdrew issues concerning the obtaining of the warrant and dismissed the false-imprisonment claims.

The appellants challenged those rulings and alleged apparent bias and prejudice from the judge’s directions. The central issues were whether the police had lawful authority to restrain occupants while executing the firearms warrant and whether any issue required determination by the jury.

1. Appeal dismissed. Hallett LJ, with whom Leveson and Waller LJJ agreed, held that the judge was entitled to withdraw the issues of reasonable and probable cause and malice. The police had acted on reliable, recently corroborated intelligence concerning potentially lethal firearms. There was no evidence that the officers had misled the magistrate, acted carelessly, or acted from malice. The resulting interference with Article 8 was justified by a pressing social need and struck a fair balance.
2. A warrant under section 46 of the Firearms Act 1968 necessarily carried an implied, or necessary, power to take reasonable steps to secure its safe and effective execution. That included limited restraint or detention of occupants where firearms were reasonably suspected. The court adopted the approach in DPP v Meaden [2003] EWHC 3005 (Admin) and applied Murray v Ministry of Defence [1988] 1 WLR 692. The extent of the implied power was a matter of fact and degree, and the police bore a heavy burden to justify interference with liberty.
3. Thames Valley Police v Hepburn [2002] EWCA Civ 1841 was confined to its facts. Its broad reasoning could not prevent necessary restraint during a warrant which expressly authorised searches of both premises and persons. The absence of an express reasonable-force provision in the Firearms Act did not exclude that limited implied power.
4. Mr Connor’s detention was admitted. Its reasonableness and lawfulness were for the judge once the facts were established, following Dallison v Caffery [1965] 1 QB 348. His short detention in handcuffs while the premises were secured was necessary and proportionate. There was no evidence that Ms Garner or the children were detained in the police car because their wills had been overborne. Even if Article 5 was engaged, any restraint was lawful, necessary and proportionate to secure compliance with the warrant.
5. The judge’s unsupported suggestion of benefit fraud was inappropriate and unnecessary. It did not, however, demonstrate apparent bias or render the trial unfair. Nor did the reference to the recent Bradford shootings prejudice the jury, since the judge expressly directed them to decide the case solely on the evidence.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Dismissed the appeal and refused renewed permission on the remaining grounds: [2006] EWCA Civ 1549.
• Liverpool County Court After a jury trial before HH Judge MacMillan, dismissed the claims for damages arising from the search-warrant operation. No citation was stated.