Gang patch ban day 1: into the unknown, subterfuge and pressure on police

Thursday, 21 November 2024

Today is Day 1 of the gang patch ban legislation coming into force, with Ministers declaring ‘the free ride for gangs is over’

A police officer who has dealt with gang members for many years says are concerns the impacts on an already stretched workforce

A gang leader says there will be some who comply, some who resort to subterfuge, and some who ‘outright challenge’ the new law

While the government talks about a ‘gang crackdown at the stroke of midnight’, some front line police are wondering how already stretched staff will cope.

The controversial gang patches ban came into effect at midnight.

Gang insignia are now banned in all public places, courts can issue non-consorting orders, and police have related increased arrest powers.

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith and Police Minister Mark Mitchell issued a joint statement on Wednesday saying “the free ride for gangs is over when the clock strikes midnight tonight, with tough new laws officially coming into effect”.

But a frontline police officer, speaking anonymously, told Stuff there remained concerns around insufficient staff numbers required to enforce the legislation.

“Everyone thinks it’s good legislation. We just don’t have the staff to implement it. That’s the biggest thing. The gang members will still wear their patches. The concern is that there’ll be a shitfight and we just don’t have the staff to deal with it,” he said.

“There’s some talk that some gang members are going to be defiant and happily fight us if we want their patch. Others have been directed by gang bosses not to wear their patches or to cover them up,” he said.

“Some will comply with the new rules, others won’t. It’s going to be a matter of ‘suck it and see’. There are also issues around when and where it applies and what it applies to in terms of insignia etc. that will need to be worked out by staff on a case by case basis”.

“The thing we’re concerned about is the time and resource its going to take given that we’re already under huge pressure with the staff we have,” he said.

Black Power life member Denis O’Reilly had attended several briefings and had met with Assistant Commissioner Paul Basham to discuss the legislation.

He said it was hard to tell what would happen in the first few days of the new law coming into force.

“[Justice Minister] Paul Goldsmith said ‘just don’t get caught’, and I think that’s the advice to everybody. If someone’s trying to forcibly get a patch of somebody, they won’t give it up easily, and that’s the unknown thing,” he said.

He said while attending the Hīkoi mō te tiriti in Wellington he noticed several adjustments to patches.

“One of the Black Power chapters, for instance, had removed the words ‘Black Power’ and replaced it with ‘Mana Whenua’. So it’s going to be interesting. There will be subterfuges, there will be people wearing the same T-shirts or something that might not necessarily be a patch, and there will be those who outright challenge the law,” he said.

“It will be interesting at times of tangi and memorial. I’m just not too sure how the police are going to handle that”.

“I think there’s been a lot of investment that’s gone into community liaison since the Tūhoe raids and the creation of the gang harm reduction unit and there’s a lot of stuff that goes on beneath the radar that is quite conducive to community safety,” he said.

“Let’s hope this doesn’t f*** it up,” he said.

Basham, who is the National Controller for Operation Nickel - the nationwide operation focused on the enforcement of the Gangs Act 2024 - told Stuff that people were unlikely to see any major change in police operations on Day 1.

“It’s hard to predict what the operating environment will look like for us from midnight tonight (12am Thursday). We’ve made a lot of effort to get out there and talk and engage with various groups and discern what the sentiment and intentions are of gangs, and it’s really mixed, as you might expect it to be,” he said.

“It’s mixed across the board, and mixed even with different clubs and gangs. Overall, that engagement has been constructive, and for the most part positive because we’ve taken the opportunity to educate, engage and encourage people to make good choices, and really telegraph our intent to move to enforcement if people don’t make good choices,” Basham said.

“I don’t expect to see some massive show of force from police tomorrow [Thursday]. It’s not realistic. We police the gangs every day and every night up and down the country. This is another tool in the toolbox and we feel we’re well resourced and ready and we will be consistent in the way we look to enforce the law as we would any other piece of legislation,” he said.

Police had held about 450 meetings in the lead up to the legislation coming into force, with numerous organisations, community groups, councils, gangs, iwi groups and whānau.

“They have been constructive and positive. Some gangs have indicated an intention to make good choices, as it were. Others have been a little more reticent and keeping their options to their chest,” Basham said.

“There has been a mixture of reaction, response and sentiment we have heard through these engagements. It remains to be seen whether that sentiment, good or bad, follows through into behaviour later on, after midnight tonight, but nothing stands out to me in terms of a particular approach by any particular group or individual”.

“We’re dealing with circa 10,000 people that sit on the national gang list, a whole lot of associates and various other affiliates that make up the wider gang community in New Zealand. It’s so layered and nuanced and complex it’s hard to say with any certainty what one group will do,” he said.

Basham said any new law would take a while to bed-in, but there would be certainty of enforcement where matters were clear cut.

“Where things are less clear cut and we need to be thoughtful, considered and measured and take the right advice around the way that we interpret the Act. We will do that and move to the appropriate enforcement action having properly consulted in a considered way. Ultimately these things will make their way through the courts. Interpretation of legislation is a matter for the courts,” he said.

“We’re a professional policing service. These are the sort of considerations we have to take all the time when we look at evidential sufficiency with any legislation”.

He said additional staff and resources had been committed to meet demand created by the legislation.

This included the establishment of the national gang unit, which included 25 positions in a support function, and the operationally-focused gang disruption units, which included 77 positions in the 12 police districts.

“It’s worth emphasising it’s a whole of police approach to this and the gang disruption units will sit in a bigger team consisting of others such as detectives, tactical crime units or others that will combine to bring effect to this legislation, depending on what we’re dealing with in the moment,” he said.

“There are always decisions we have to make about demand of any nature and this becomes another factor in the way that we prioritise how we fit in our work and occasionally we have to make some trade-offs relative to what else is going on”.

“Overall I think we’re well placed to be able to police the legislation, noting that safety will always come first,” he said.