Exclusive: Labor questions if removal of LECC chief commissioner Michael Adams was an attempt to shut down inquiry

This article is more than 7 months old

This article is more than 7 months old

A landmark inquiry into potentially illegal strip searches conducted on minors by police in New South Wales has been cut short after the government sacked the commissioner overseeing the probe.

On Wednesday the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission confirmed it will no longer hold further hearings as part of the inquiry, which last year uncovered evidence of the widespread misuse of strip search powers by police in NSW.

The LECC had been due to hold more public hearings in either late January or February into the psychological impacts of strip searching on minors, but in a brief statement a spokeswoman for the LECC said it now had “no intention to call further evidence at this stage”.

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While the report will still be published its release date is “yet to be determined”, she said.

The decision to cut the inquiry short comes just a month after the NSW government announced it would not renew the term of its chief commissioner, Michael Adams, which prompted accusations his removal was a “cynical” attempt to cut the inquiry short.

The public hearings – and wider concerns about the strip searching of minors – had caused significant embarrassment for the NSW government and police force, and on Wednesday NSW Labor’s shadow attorney general, Paul Lynch, questioned why the hearings had been cancelled after Adams’ removal.

“If the strip search inquiry has been prematurely shut down because the government wouldn’t extend the term of the chief commissioner, then the government stands condemned,” he said.

“It is entirely their fault. You can only conclude the government wanted this inquiry over. It had created embarrassment for them and this is their cynical response.”

The government’s special minister of state, Don Harwin, disputed that conclusion. A spokesman said the LECC was an independent statutory office and the administration of public hearings was “entirely a matter for the acting commissioner”, Reginald Blanch QC.

“It is not possible or appropriate for the government to instruct or direct the LECC in relation to the exercise of its functions,” he said.

But Adams, a QC and former NSW supreme court judge who drove the establishment of the strip search inquiry, had a reputation for forthrightness that had seen him have numerous run-ins with the government and law enforcement figures.

Less than a fortnight before his removal he drew the ire of the NSW Police Association after he told a parliamentary inquiry there was “significant corruption” within the ranks of NSW police, saying “otherwise, for example, bikie gangs could not be the major manufacturers of methamphetamine in NSW”.

Following his removal in December, a report in The Australian said the government had not renewed Adams’ contract after a confidential inquiry found the agency was “dysfunctional” and raised concerns about leadership at the highest levels.

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On Wednesday that report was released publicly for the first time. It revealed that while a number of complaints had been made about Adams by another LECC commissioner, Patrick Saidi, none of them had been upheld.

Instead, that inquiry considered whether Saidi himself may have engaged in “maladministration or misconduct”, but did not make a finding. Guardian Australia understands Saidi was removed from the LECC in January, shortly after Adams.

Held in October and December, the public hearings revealed a disturbing pattern of police misusing strip search powers on minors, as well as evidence that many police do not understand the laws governing strip searches.

In one case a 16-year-old girl was fearful and in tears after she was forced to strip naked and squat in front of a police officer who then “looked underneath” her at the Splendour in the Grass festival in 2018.

In another, a 15-year-old boy said he “shook with nerves” after a police officer told him to “hold your dick and lift your balls up and show me your gooch” during a search at an under-18s music festival in February last year.