PUBLIC PEACE IN RELATION TO A PUBLIC PLACE

• Date: 06 February 2019

(1) "Had an incident occurred in a public place which the policeman had reason to believe was likely to cause a breach of the peace, he could arrest the offender, provided it appeared that the commission of the offence of disturbing the public peace could not otherwise be prevented. Here, however, the incident occurred in a hotel, a private place; and it appears from the evidence that the policeman was of the opinion that the appellant was drunk and misbehaving. Assuming that the appellant was drunk and misbehaving, it was for the policeman to report the matter to the owner or manager of the hotel with the suggestion that the latter ask the appellant to leave the premises. Had the owner or manager of the hotel so requested the appellant to leave and he had refused, then the policeman might have arrested him on the ground that there was reasonable belief that the appellant had committed an offence contrary to section 402 of the Penal Code. This was not done and in the circumstances of this appeal we would agree that if the arrest preceded the assault such arrest would have been unlawful." - Per Smith, S.P.J., in Chukwuka v. Police (1964) N.R.N.L.R. 21 at 24.

(2) "Mr. Ikomi, who appreared for the appellant, submitted that the Horizontal Hotel was a public place and cited in support the case of Brannan v. Peek, (1948) 1 K.B. 68; (1947) 2 All E.R. 527. In that case, the question was whether or not a public house was a place within the definition in section 1 (4) of the Street Betting Act, 1906. In that subsection, "public place" was defined thus: "the wordpublic place shall include any public park, garden or seabeach and any unenclosed ground to which the public for the time being have unrestricted access and shall also include every enclosed place (not being a public park or garden) of...