FTO AUSTRALIA

Okay so an interesting question, it's long but -

I was driving home the other night from a friend's place who lives close by. It was late and I was keen to get home so it wasn't a cruise as such. Having said that, I didn't exceed the speed limit and maintained a safe speed through corners considering the time of night.

A couple of streets from my place, I turned left in front of a stock falcon and admittedly used all of my lane through the corner (but stayed within my lane). I was about 3 corners from home and noticed the falcon come up quickly behind. I'd had a look at it through the corner and knew it wasn't HWP, so I was a little weirded out by why it was following me so quickly.

I kept the pace in order to pull into my driveway before it caught me up, at which point they stopped across the driveway and I waited to see what they would do before I got out of the car. They waited about 20 seconds then took off. I thought perhaps they were young guys looking for a fight or something.

I found out later that it was undercover police (should have twigged to the steel rims on the car) and that they ran a check of my plates before taking off.

Now although I wasn't breaking any laws on my drive home, I'm aware that police often aren't all that discerning. My question is, I was under the impression that once you enter private property, police aren't able to enter it without your permission. Meaning, I could have said goodnight, walked inside and they would have been unable to pursue it, ie look for defects or RBT. Can anyone confirm if that is correct?

that sounds about right...unless you would have let them in your garage then they wouldnt have been able to check your car. The reason they followed you is probably because they were in fact going to pull you over, but you probably didnt give them enough time to find anything since you lived close to where you were. But yes, i believe a police officer cannot fine you or look for defects on your car once it is on private property.

Once i was in my driving reversing in and i had my seat belt off and a police car was stopped at the traffic lights, and i saw them looking at me. Im sure if i was on the road they would have stopped me and questioned/fined me.

They can come onto your turf anytime they like, provided they have reasonable suspicion - ie if they thought you were p*ssed or a drug peddler.

Correct, they can also come to the door and ask to speak to the owner/driver of the car parked outside...

Bennoz wrote:They can come onto your turf anytime they like, provided they have reasonable suspicion - ie if they thought you were p*ssed or a drug peddler.

Okay, granted they could RBT / drug test you (which wouldn't really concern me ).

But, could they proceed to go defect hunting on the car parked in the driveway etc?

yep as Ben and Kaz both said the ew laws alow them to do a serch if they have a resason for it ie. the way you were driving even if you were not speeding .
they would have just said that you were driving suspishusly (sorry about spelling )

Haha okay, lesson learnt:

If you're driving with gusto they can do you, regardless of if you've broken any laws or not.

If you've done nothing to create suspicion, you can tell them to get nicked.

Guess that means I should stop creating suspicion

Cheers guys!