Correct on the date of publication - 30 September 2024

Question: 

A person has been arrested for an offence and has been detained for nine hours and then bailed to return to the police station under section 47 of PACE. During the period of the bail, evidence has come to light which would allow for the person to be arrested for another offence.

If the person returned to the police station in answer to his bail for the original offence and was arrested at the general enquiry desk prior to entering the custody suite for the further offence, how much time would there be on the detention clock?

Answer:

Central to this issue is when does a person surrender to custody? When he reports to the police station or is accepted back into custody by the custody officer?

Section 47(6) of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 provides that where a person has been granted bail and has either attended at the police station in accordance with the grant of bail (or has been arrested under section 46A is detained at a police station), any time during which he was in police detention prior to being granted bail shall be included as part of any period which falls to be calculated under part IV of the Act.

The operative words of the provision are -

'has been granted bail and ..... has attended at the police station in accordance with the grant of bail'.

Section 47(6) becomes operative as soon as the person attends the police station whilst answering his bail. Logically, that is normally when he enters the building and makes himself known to appropriate staff and not when he arrives in the car park, but there has been no formal judgement on that point.

Applying this approach in relation to the example in the question, it follows that if the person attended the police station in answer to his bail, then fifteen hours would remain 'on the clock', even for the new offence.

If, the individual were to be arrested for the further offence prior to him attending the police station, albeit only by a few minutes, a new twenty four hour detention clock would start under section 47(2) and (7).

When further offences come to light, sufficient to justify arrest, whilst the person is on bail, or new evidence emerges whilst the person is on bail, the most appropriate course will probably be to arrest the individual before he answers his bail.

Also see the question relating to new evidence and delays in putting before custody officer.

View the full Legal Q&A document here, with links to related and similar legal questions. 

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