Deputy Speaker, the old section 49 of the Criminal Procedure Act provided that killing someone suspected of having committed a Schedule 1 offence would be justifiable homicide, if he could not be arrested or prevented from fleeing in any other way. The Constitutional Court ruled on the old section 49 in 2002. As you have heard, hon members, Judge Kriegler, for a unanimous court, took the trouble in State v Walters to tabulate in plain terms when, why and how force and deadly force might be used to effect arrest. Our amendment relies on these guidelines for the sake of legal certainty.
Let us remember that the Constitution means what the Constitutional Court says it means. We uphold the power of judicial review and the separation of powers, and we must abide by its rulings.
Our only task as a committee, therefore, was to ensure that this amendment was a true reflection of the Kriegler ruling and tabulation. It is a true reflection, and it is in part, in fact, verbatim.
Force must always be "reasonably necessary and proportional" in the circumstances, and deadly force, including shooting, may in addition be used only if "the suspect poses a threat of serious violence to the arrestor or any other person" or persons, or if the suspect is reasonably suspected of having committed a crime involving serious bodily harm and there are no other reasonable means of arresting him at that time or later.
Let us remember also that this is not just about the police. Citizens' arrests are also governed by this section; it therefore directly affects every one of us here and everybody outside. So, let us remember then that the purpose of arrest is to bring a suspect before court for trial, but that it is not the only means of doing that, that it may never be used to punish a suspect. That that is what the judge said, and that that is what we therefore need not only our police to observe but also we ourselves, should we come into a situation where we need to effect an arrest. [Applause.]