A driver who hit two sheep at 140kmh and rolled his car on a gravel road has sparked a legal case of "national significance" to police.
Caine Storey Ritchie (21) was in his Toyota Hilux in Mt Stuart Rd, Waitahuna, on the evening of April 30 last year, the Dunedin District Court heard last week.
Rounding a bend at high speed, Ritchie — who was not wearing a seat belt — slammed into two sheep, braked, over-corrected his steering and rolled his vehicle.
He was ejected from the Toyota as it flipped, and was found unconscious beside the crash site by a local farmer.
Ritchie was airlifted to hospital.
Under the Land Transport Act, police are allowed to seize and impound a vehicle for 10 working days to enable a "scientific examination" of evidence.
Officers accessed Ritchie’s on-board computer and analysed the data it held, which established he was travelling at 140kmh when the incident took place.
The defendant denied the charge of driving at dangerous speed on the basis that police had acted unlawfully in gathering the evidence.
At a hearing last month counsel Andy Belcher argued the police should have obtained a search warrant to access the computer.
He stressed the Land Transport Act became law in 1998 and its writers could not have envisaged the type of technology that would be commonplace 25 years later.
"We spend an awful lot of time in our vehicles and they’re increasingly computerised," Mr Belcher said.
"It collects and stores information about the person in the car. There must be a high expectation of privacy."
He told the court there had been "raging debate" on the issue in North America.
Police prosecutor James Collins said the critical issue was the distinction between the car’s computer and a laptop.
"It’s an electronic device but it’s not a computer in the same sense that people are using it in the day-to-day to store personal and private information," he said.
Mr Collins said the legal issue was one of "national significance".
In delivering his decision Judge Jim Large noted there was no New Zealand case law on the point.
"There may need to be some law on it," he said.
The judge agreed with police — the car had been searched and examined within the bounds of the legislation.
Shortly after the evidence was ruled admissible, and a conviction at trial therefore inevitable, Ritchie pleaded guilty.
He was banned from driving for six months and fined $500.
Mr Belcher said there had been fair greater costs: his client’s $30,000 uninsured Toyota had been written off.
"It was a bad night for him," he said.
"It could’ve been a lucky night. He didn’t kill himself," replied the judge.
University of Auckland associate professor of law Scott Optican concurred with the court’s assessment.
"I admit you have an expectation of privacy in your car but this kind of disembodied information that’s held by the computer could just as easily have been accessed by a speed camera. I’m not convinced you have a huge expectation of privacy," he said.
Had officers sought a search warrant to access the data, Mr Optican said it would have been a "no-brainer" for a judge.
"They’re doing the right thing flagging this at a national level, coming up with policy around this," he said.
"Police need to be responsive to new investigation techniques."
