Erasing Context in the Courtroom Construal of Consent

Abstract

Late one night in downtown Brisbane (in the Australian state of Queensland), six armed police officers approached three young teenage Aboriginal boys, said something to them, and then escorted each of them into a different police vehicle. The three vehicles then drove the boys 14 kilometers out of town to a dark industrial wasteland at Pinkenba (hence this case is usually referred to as the Pinkenba case). Here the police officers and the boys got out of the cars, and the police said various things to the boys and then drove off without them. Many hours later the boys found their way back to town, mostly by walking, and also by taking a $5 taxi ride for a small part of the way, with money given to them along the way by a security guard. A complaint from the boys' families led to an investigation by the Criminal Justice Commission, which resulted in criminal charges being laid against the six police officers. They were charged with unlawful deprivation of liberty: that they had "unlawfully deprived" the three boys of their liberty by "carrying them away in a motor vehicle against their will." The boys were never charged with any offense on that night or related to that night, and thus they were not under arrest. The police officers never denied the facts outlined here.