Police acknowledge the Independent Police Conduct Authority's findings into a traffic stop and later use of force in late 2022.
On 22 December 2022, a road policing officer came across a woman who gave him a thumbs down gesture while driving past.
The officer believed the woman may have been under the influence of drugs or alcohol due to her behaviour, so signalled for her to stop.
Ms Z was followed to an address approximately 800 metres away, and did not comply with the officer's request for her license, attempting to leave the scene.
During an altercation to affect her arrest she shut the officer's hand in a door causing a deep laceration.
Ms Z was subsequently pepper sprayed by the officer, and she was taken into custody.
She was charged with failing to stop, failing to provide her name and address and resisting arrest. She plead guilty to those charges in June 2025.
The IPCA carried out an investigation into the matter.
It determined that the officer was unjustified in stopping the woman, and the subsequent use of force was also unjustified.
Police note the Authority's findings in this matter.
Superintendent Naila Hassan, Waitematā District Commander, says: "The officer involved is experienced, working in road policing for more than a decade.
"Police consider that such gestures may reasonably indicate driver impairment, so stopping a driver's vehicle to determine whether the driver is impaired is squarely within a police officer's lawful authority."
Police note the IPCA's consideration that unsolicited gestures are not a genuine land transport purpose for a stop.
"Police found his actions were lawful and justified given that he was acting within his capacity as a Police officer and in accordance with the Land Transport Act 1998," Superintendent Hassan says.
She says taking this into account Police do not intend on taking further action in this matter.
