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Customs and Excise Act 2018

Customs powers - Powers in relation to goods

243: Power to seize, copy, and detain certain drugs and objectionable publications

You could also call this:

"Customs officers can take and hold certain bad things, like drugs or naughty books, if they think they're against the law."

Illustration for Customs and Excise Act 2018

If you are a Customs officer, you can seize and detain certain goods if you think they might be evidence of a crime. This can happen when you are inspecting, searching, or examining something under the Customs and Excise Act 2018. You might suspect a crime has been committed under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975 or the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act 1993.

If you detain goods, you can deliver them to the right person, keep them for further investigation, or treat them as forfeited, but only if that person agrees. The right person is usually a constable or an Inspector of Publications, depending on the type of crime.

When goods are delivered to the right person, they become responsible for them. Goods can include documents, but some rules do not apply to documents. You can copy documents that are detained and the same rules apply to the copy as the original.

There are also rules from the Search and Surveillance Act 2012 that apply to the powers of Customs officers under this section, which you can find by following the links to Subparts 1, 5, 6, 7, 9, and 10 of Part 4. However, some parts of the Search and Surveillance Act 2012 do not apply to goods that have been forfeited, such as sections 125(4), 131(5)(f), and 133, and subpart 6 of Part 4.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM7039535.

Topics:
Crime and justice > Police and safetyHealth and wellbeing > Public health
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242: Power to seize and detain risk goods or goods involved in certain offences, etc, or

"Customs officers can take goods from you if they think they're a risk or involved in a crime."

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244: Detention of goods suspected to be instrument of crime or tainted property, or

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Part 4Customs powers
Powers in relation to goods

243Power to seize, copy, and detain certain drugs and objectionable publications

  1. A Customs officer may seize and detain any goods that are presented or located in the course of exercising any power of inspection, search, or examination under this Act, if he or she has cause to suspect on reasonable grounds that the goods are evidence of the commission of an offence under any of the following enactments:

  2. section 6, 7, 12A, 13, or 22 of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975:
    1. section 123, 124, 131, or 131A of the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act 1993.

      1. A Customs officer who detains goods under this section may, if the appropriate person specified in subsection (4) agrees, do any of the following:

      2. deliver the goods into the custody of the appropriate person:
        1. retain the goods pending further investigation:
          1. treat the goods as forfeited.

            1. Once goods have been delivered to the appropriate person, responsibility for those goods passes to that person.

            2. The appropriate person referred to in subsections (2) and (3) is,—

            3. in relation to an enactment referred to in subsection (1)(a), a constable:
              1. in relation to an enactment referred to in subsection (1)(b), an Inspector of Publications within the meaning of the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act 1993.

                1. In this section, goods includes documents that would not otherwise be goods, except that subsection (2)(c) does not apply to such documents.

                2. A Customs officer may copy any document that is detained under this section and subsections (2) and (3) apply to any copy as they apply to the original document.

                3. Subparts 1, 5, 6, 7, 9, and 10 of Part 4 of the Search and Surveillance Act 2012 apply in respect of the powers under this section.

                4. Despite subsection (7), sections 125(4), 131(5)(f), and 133, and subpart 6 of Part 4, of the Search and Surveillance Act 2012 do not apply to forfeited goods.

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