SENIOR Corporate Area Magistrate Judith Pusey yesterday bashed the police over the long-held practice of arresting suspects before gathering evidence against them.

“The police need to get out of the habit of arresting people then investigate,” an obviously peeved Pusey said. “You can’t arrest and then investigate.”

Pusey made the comment after attorney Patrick Bailey made an application of habeas corpus for his client — who has been in the custody of the police for some time without being charged — to be brought to court.

Bailey said that his client had turned himself over to the police earlier this month after they named him as a person of interest in serious crimes in a Corporate Area inner-city community.

Asked to explain the police’s position, Superintendent Cornwall ‘Bigga’ Ford of the Flying Squad told the court that the man would be released by Friday if a witness fails to identify him.

Ford said that the man’s name had come up in a number of murders within the community.

Bailey’s application was among a throng of similar motions by attorneys complaining that their clients were being held in police custody for extended periods without charge.

Pusey had earlier told the complaining lawyers that they couldn’t expect to “muscle” the system with such applications as the police, at the same time, had a right to detain persons suspected of committing crimes.