“Innocent Until Proven Guilty” or “If You Have Nothing To Hide, You Have Nothing To Fear”

There was a major Police operation at Brighton station on Friday, with more than a dozen officers funnelling people toward a metal detector. I sent Sussex Police the following email:

I would be grateful if you could provide the following information:

1. Under what legislation were police officers compelling people to walk through the metal detectors?

2. Were people issued with forms informing them of the reason for the search, the outcome of the search and the names of the officers involved?

3. If there was no compulsion to go through the metal detectors, were members of the public informed of this prior to agreeing to the search? If not, why not?

4. If there was no compulsion to be searched, can you clarify the following sentence take from a report in the Argus newspaper? "Plain clothes police officers made sure people who tried to avoid the scans were checked."

5. Under what legislation were plain clothes police entitled to monitor members of the public and compel them to undergo a search? Did these officers identify themselves to the people involved?

6. Notices at the station told members of the public that this was an operation to reduce the number of knives and other weapons. Why, then, were sniffer dogs deployed?

7. If sniffer dogs were deployed to detect drugs, why were the notices displayed to the public about the operation incorrect and misleading?