Section III

[Quentin Campbell]

Re. the arrest at Kingston University the other day.

I have been trying to work through some of the practical considerations of
a Special Branch officer coming to my place of work and serving on me a
S46 notice that contains a secrecy provision. 

Can the lawyers on this list point me at any similar situations of which
they have experience? In particular, is there any other provision in
English Law that requires a person, not suspected of a crime, to carry out
an act in total secrecy on pain of imprisonment? 

What happens if I say to the officer who serves me the notice that 
I refuse to cooperate and that he will have to arrest me?

Is my unwillingness to comply "immediately" with the S46 Notice an
"arrestable offence"? How quickly do I have to comply? 

Suppose it is an arrestable offence.  The SB officer arrests me and takes
me to a police station.

Now there is nothing in the RIP Bill that I have seen that suspends my
rights (such as they are) as an arrested person. So I say that I want the
Duty Solicitor present when I am interviewed and that I also want to
notify my family of my arrest. 

As I cannot be held without a proper reason the Police, and not me, have
to explain that my arrest followed my refusal to compply with a S46
Notice. 

Whether the Notice had a secrecy clause in it or not have I just forced
the Police to themselves "tip-off" by making public the "offence" for
which I was arrested. Does this negate the whole effect of the secrecy
provisions of S46 and S50? 

There is nothing in the RIP Bill that says any offence prosecuted under it
must be tried "in camera". Does this not mean that the LEAs themselves are
forced into "tipping-off" by virtue of launching a prosecution?

There will be cases where suspects can be under surveillance for years
while evidence is gathered. If a LEA acts prematurely and issues a S46
Notice with a secrecy provision on some person only indirectly linked with
the case and that person can not or will not comply then what does the LEA
do? It can not hold off indefinitely from prosecuting. Could the time
limit to prosecute an RIP Bill offence elapse before the main suspects
under investigation are arrested? 

Perhaps I am clutching at straws here.

IANAL but it seems to me that the whole edifice that attempts to cloak the
operation of RIP provisons in secrecy could be undermined by the effect of
Police and Court procedures and practice.

Quentin 
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