Tonight on Sunday ` what happens when a police dog gets the wrong man? DOG BARKS VICIOUSLY My inner thigh had been ripped open. Noises in the night, gets up to check,... My left bicep had been severed through. I remember seeing his eyes. ...and finds himself in a nightmare. 'Christ, what the hell is this?' How did they get it so wrong? It was a serious and unacceptable incident. There was no accountability. None whatsoever. Hi, I'm John Hudson. We all love a police dog fearlessly protecting us against the bad guys. But in 2010, a law-abiding civilian was savaged by a police dog. Police admitted they'd got it badly wrong. But the matter was buried so deep in secrecy that for three years, the victim couldn't get answers. Ask yourself this ` if the police make a serious mistake, is it our right to know? Some may find the images in this story challenging. Here's Mark Crysell. PERCUSSIVE MUSIC Time, it is said, heals all wounds. But scars go deeper. My inner thigh had been ripped open; uh, my left bicep had been severed through; my chest plate had been opened up. Hamish McCourtie's scars remind him every day that justice has not been seen to be done. The only alternative's to walk away, and I'm just not quite sure how to do that. He's a successful businessman, and, by all accounts, a model citizen. Have you been in trouble with the police before? Have you been in trouble with the police before? No. No, I haven't. No. (PLAYS CLASSICAL MUSIC) Hamish is a father to two children and a partner to Natalie ` a former Russian concert pianist. Domestic bliss till 3.30am, August 25th 2010. PLAYING CRESCENDOS Tyres scream out in a Parnell street. TYRES SCREECH Just hurled out of bed and thought there's been an accident. A trained medic, Hamish was looking to do the right thing. So I started heading down the driveway... Then out of the deep, dark nowhere... (BARKS SAVAGELY) The dog jumps up,... BARKING CONTINUES ...and I just felt this crunch into my right chest plate, and I just went, 'Christ, what the hell is this?' I mean, I just felt this weight, realised it was a dog. A highly trained attack dog. The harder I pushed, the harder he bit, so it just got harder and harder. It was horrendous. Just slammed my thumbs into his muzzle and just squeezed as hard as I could, just trying to get him off, still yelling and screaming that, 'I'm just a bloody neighbour! 'Get` Get the thing off me'. Lights go on. The neighbourhood terrified. BARKING CONTINUES I've heard screaming and yelling. It was so loud that I was just too scared to come out And I could just feel him opening up my thigh. I screamed out, 'What are you doing to him?' I remember seeing his eyes. One of his legs was on my arm, and he just ripped in, and he was turning his head, and I could just feel my bicep opening up. And he was right here on the ground, all curled up. He was moaning in pain, and I could see all this blood and` and pieces of meat... just sticking out. Hamish McCourtie's body had been torn apart by one of the police's armed-offenders dogs hunting for car-stereo thieves. At that point, uh, I heard the officer with the dog saying something along the lines that, 'We've got a civvie. We've got a civilian.' DOG BARKS VICIOUSLY Something had gone very wrong here, and the police knew it. A dog had been given the 'rouse' command and let go through this dense bush into a cul-de-sac full of houses, trained to attack the first thing it saw, and that was Hamish McCourtie. Its line of sight ` it will hit what's in front of it, and I was in front of it. It took a full week in an ICU ward to patch this up. Got so many scars, and they're not pretty scars. It's here, it's there, and it's not pretty at all. I think... when you have more than five of those, you probably don't feel like it makes me more attractive of a man. The police paid a visit. The words basically were that it was regrettable what had happened. And, uh, the words 'sorry', uh, weren't used specifically. And as he lay in his hospital bed three years ago, Hamish told Auckland police bosses he wanted just one thing. There's just no way that that dog team should be back on the road until the investigation had been completed. Um, I made that very clear. DOG BARKS This is the dog who attacked Hamish. Stay inside! Stay inside! His name is Tank, and this is his handler, Constable Justin Moore. Get inside. Get inside. Within a week, Tank and Constable Moore were back on the streets. Stay inside. Police had not even started their investigation into the attack. It was at that point I started to change my whole view from doing the right thing, uh, from the police side, to, 'This` This is not` not how it should be going.' Is there any way that you could see that that dog and that handler should have been allowed back on the streets? Without a full and complete investigation, I cannot for the life of me today understand how that dog could` and dog and dog handler could be back on the road. A greater shock was to follow. This is the internal police report into the incident. So you might think that if the report concerned you, then it would be readily available. But, no, it took Hamish months to get a hold of this, and when he did, large parts were blacked out ` what the Americans like to call 'heavily redacted'. But in black and white, a serious breach of police protocol. Dogs should only be released when the offender is in line of sight. So I'll put him in his harness here... Constable Moore admitted he'd let Tank go, given him the command of attack with no idea of who was out there. The handler had indicated to his superiors that, um, that he'd made a mistake, and that he'd got it wrong. What were his actual words? What were his actual words? Uh, 'It was my <BLEEP> up.' It gets worse. Constable Moore's certificate to operate a police dog had expired eight months ago. He should not even have been in control of Tank. This is a trained AOS dog ` armed offenders dog ` it's an attack dog. It's designed to be very effective. The dog had been released incorrectly against protocol; the guy who's the` the` the constable who's running the dog is not certified. Uh, it` it` it's just` It probably couldn't get any worse from that perspective at all. The police report found that this was 'not an insignificant event' and Constable Moore had erred in his decision to release the dog. Far tougher was the national co-coordinator of police dogs, Inspector Brendon Gibson. Inspector Gibson said Constable Moore's explanations were confused and unbelievable. He called on Moore to accept responsibility for what happened on that night rather than grasp at straws to try and excuse it. So, what happened to Constable Moore? How was he disciplined? Well, we can't tell you. The details are in here, but the police have blacked them out. Uh, found to been breaching the codes of conduct. All he wanted was for someone to be held responsible, but Hamish McCourtie was about to smash into an impenetrable wall of legislation and bureaucracy. What we started with up here was.. innocent victim. And somewhere behind that wall, police accountability. What drives me is sometimes when you replay that night in your head, you think to yourself, 'Does someone else have to go through this as well?' And why should they? After the break ` who's policing the police? Do you believe police are held accountable for their actions when things go wrong? We'll now demonstrate the importance of having a car with side curtain airbags. Ooh! Your go, Greg. ENGINE REVS Whoa! If you want to buy a new car, check it for side curtain airbags. (MAN) TV NARRATOR: It's a cold mid-winter Auckland evening... Tank at work, filmed for a reality TV series. ...are called to an unusual... But this is no easy watch for Hamish McCourtie. Delta dog squad Constable Justin and his dog, Tank, are called to an unusual... So is the first time you've seen Tank since the accident? So is the first time you've seen Tank since the accident? Yes, it is, yeah. Tank's the same police dog that savagely attacked him on his driveway. (MAN) TV NARRATOR: Tank's no slouch, and once he's got a sniff, he doesn't let go. That's the tongue that was in my face. I remember it well. The scars from that night are emotional as well as physical. Hamish can't get the image out of his mind of his family hearing Tank tear into him. They're in a house which is` is pitch black; they can hear their` their father outside. It would have been horrendous, and for me, that's probably still the most traumatic thing. I find that a bit of a struggle. I mean, first year was hell. I` I just want to forget that. I don't want to ever remember this. It was very hard on all of us. We really got by just because we had some hopes, you know. This appears to be working, so that's fully finished now. Hamish is a driven man ` the head of a successful international textile business; Sheen. Can I just have the sample over here? The silver one underneath... always been on the side of the forces of law and order. High profile lawyer Gary Gottleib has known him since he was a kid. I've known him for many years, and, uh, and I can say that he is a very honest, conservative, law-abiding citizen who I think is completely shocked with what's happened here. And, um, latched on... Hamish McCourtie was deeply disturbed about the way the police were treating him. I was very very perturbed about the fact the officer had been put back on the circulation, the dog was back in circulation; that what had happened to me was` was just, there was no accountability, none whatsoever. So he placed his faith in the Independent Police Conduct Authority, the IPCA, under Justice Lowell Goddard. When sit back as a citizen and sort of look at what kind of processes are in place to protect the citizens, where light doesn't shine, you get rot. The IPCA found that Constable Moore's actions in releasing Tank were unjustified and unreasonable. The fact that Moore was uncertified was undesirable, but apart from making recommendations to police over policy, that was it. The conclusion, having been through what I've been through, is that the Independent Police Conduct Authority in its current position, and the laws and the legislation which it operates, is toothless. It has absolutely no means to effect any true oversight of the police. They should be able to be in a position to say, 'This requires compensation, 'the behaviour of the police officer is` is unacceptable,' or various other things that happen. But they` they then, under the present law, can't do that. Hamish wouldn't let go, but his options were running out. He took legal advice over taking a private prosecution against the police. It would cost a hell of a lot of money, and he might not be` probably would not be successful at all. And, you know, you can only do so much, and in the end, this is a civil matter, which is based on the law, and the law really doesn't help at all. Effectively, we have in front of us four pieces of acts or legislations which sit like this. And this over here is the Privacy Act, and then we have the employment law, and then over here you have the ACC Act. Employment and privacy laws prevented Hamish knowing what disciplinary action was taken against Constable Moore. And ACC is a no-fault system. It makes it virtually impossible to sue. And these four pieces of legislation effectively ` or acts ` provide an umbrella to the police for which they can literally reside. And by sitting under that umbrella, they can walk away from a situation where when we look at accountability, I mean, the end of all of this is that you get nil. And that's the end of the sum of this entire process. I find it embarrassing as a lawyer that we have laws like this. Do you believe police are held accountable for their actions when things go wrong? By and large, no. Hamish met once more with police. They offered some money for out-of-pocket expenses, ripped clothing and medical bills. I said to them, 'Then what would make it right?' If there's no accountability, no changes, and I had to swallow the process, then what was the accountability? And I said, 'What would it be worth for a situation like mine? 'What's the value and that, sort of, subjective amount?' I said, 'Is it a million dollars? Is it $500,000?' Got down and said, 'Is it $100,000?' Is this about the money? The only thing that seems to make people accountable in government bodies is eventually if the police, through these types of actions, continually get in the situation where they're writing out large cheques to people to make up to innocent victims for collateral damage, then somebody's gonna turn around and go, 'Gentlemen, we wanna find out why we're spending so much money 'patching up innocent victims.' There needs to be a process that allows for accountability. I don't need the money. What I wanna see is a legislative change. It took a year after the dog attack for Hamish to get a letter from the police saying sorry. And then the new head of the IPCA, Sir David Carruthers, started writing to him. Sunday has seen those letters. Sir David is sympathetic to Hamish's plight but is unable to reopen the case. Sir David had a very, uh, open mind to the fact that from his observations, my situation was somewhat untenable. But more importantly, Sir David has spoken to the Police Commissioner about the secrecy surrounding internal police discipline, with the aim of making it more transparent. Do you get the sense that he is frustrated? I think if anybody of intellect with an understanding of NZ law and what it is as a country we represent, could be nothing but frustrated. No chairman in the IPCA has the tools to effect any kind of oversight that's responsible to NZ citizens. (BARKS VICIOUSLY) Three years ago on this driveway, an civilian was mauled by a police dog. The Police's own investigation found serious breaches of protocol, but that's where the trail goes cold. Essentially, the police are saying, 'We've looked into it. We've dealt with it. 'But you are just not allowed to see it.' The police minister wouldn't do an interview, and after weeks of waiting, Police sent us a written response. That seems to have a lot of effect upon the police, being publicly embarrassed, and, uh, they'll` they'll spend a bit of time talking to their spin masters before they respond. I don't know if they're coming on the show. Are they? We've been negotiating with Police for months to come on Sunday and answer our questions. Meanwhile, Hamish still doesn't know how Constable Justin Moore, the uncertified dog handler who broke the rules by releasing Tank, was held accountable. I` I think the day that your front line police and their supporting networks and systems and superiors are able to wash away what's happened to me the way it's been done, I don't think the system could be any worse. The IPCA chairman, Sir David Carruthers, declined an interview. But he has asked Parliament for greater powers to investigate the police. But what about the police? What did they have to say to Mr McCourtie? 'Christ, what the hell is this?' I mean, it was just` I was just shocked, and the power of his jaws ` I mean, it was incredible. You know, it was way` way more than I could have ever imagined. (BARKS VICIOUSLY) Like Hamish McCourtie, Sunday had some questions for the police. We wanted to know why Tank was off the leash; was this accepted practice; was Constable Moore disciplined, and how? And why all the secrecy? Mark Crysell with the Auckland City Police District Commander, Mike Clement. This was a` a little bit like lobbing a grenade into a` a bunch of houses, isn't it, wasn't it? Well, and the dog` the dog handler on this occasion ` it was` it was late at night ` um, was freshly pursuing some people who` who'd jumped out of a car and taken off. And he believed the noises that he could hear and possibly were the offenders, but he did not have sight of the offender. So, absolutely, I mean, there is... On any analysis as the rules exist then, and` and since in terms of how they've been modified ` he just did not meet the standard. It can't have helped that he wasn't certified either? Well` Well,... (SIGHS) in nobody's eyes is that going to be seen as helping, but the re` the reality is he was trained. He had been on the` all of the training opportunities and the dog trials, and he had passed them, and the certification process had not been completed. So that doesn't help. So that doesn't help. He broke the most basic rule. He` Well, he did. Not in terms of the certification, but in terms of releasing the dog without having sighted the offender, broke fundamental rules, and as a consequence, the` the` the attack on Mr McCourtie happened. Um, it's as` It's as plain as that. What changes were made as a result of this incident? Very much more clarity around the deployment rules ` that a police dog handler can only release a dog from the harness when the offender has been sighted, and` and if it's reasonable to do so, um, to call on the person who's fleeing to desist. What happened to Constable Moore? Well, Constable Moore was stood down from operational police dog deployment on that` as a result of that incident. And he was assessed from within the dog section here in Auckland around control and safety and passed that test and was put back on to police dog duties. So before the investigation was completed? Before the investigation was completed, yes. Before the investigation was completed, yes. That doesn't seem right. Well, the first` The first point of concern was 'was the dog team safe?' So was the dog safe, and was Constable Moore's control of the dog safe? When I look back at it now, I can see absolutely how that is perceived. The reality is that at the time, the policy was different. Constable Moore's understanding of the policy wasn't as clear as it should have been, so that's both he as an individual had a responsibility to know what that policy was, and the` the dog section working to that policy were critical elements of that. So that's been made very much more clear since that incident. Inspector Brendon Gibson ` he was very scathing. He said that he refused to accept responsibility, um, grasping at straws, those sorts of issues. He'd been cleared in the reassessment. Should he have still been cleared after an assessment like that by the top handler of dogs in the country? Um, if you're asking if I would have done it differently, yes, I would have done it differently. The other dimension that was missing was going back then to Mr McCourtie and explain to him what was happening. Constable Moore ` why can't you tell us why` how he was disciplined? Because employment law requires that that's` that's about the only bit in terms of the legislation that I can't share with you, because there is this need for transparency versus this natural justice. So, uh, where the two meet is the decision I have to make in terms of what I share with people. But he was disciplined, and it's been made very clear, and I don't think he'll fail again with regard to policy in relation to how he deploys the dog. It's about, I guess, at the end of the day, accountability. And if you can't see what happens to someone, how do you know that they've been held to account? Well, I get that. I absolutely get it. And it's the same reason why other people subject to the same process in terms of employment law are in the same position. And it's the same reason why even in the criminal environment there are occasions when people don't get to find out what the outcome is for a host of reasons. I guess some could even see it as convenient that they're there. Well, of course they might label it as convenient. But there's` But there's no one that works in around me that` that would leverage off the legislation in a way that is talked about as being convenient. It's just what it is. We're` We're not the legislators; we work with the legislation. So it can be a frustration for us, just like it can be a frustration for everybody else. Hamish McCourtie says this system is broken. I think he wants backing for legislative change. He wants you guys to support that too. I don't want to leave the impression with people that what we have currently doesn't work, because it does work, and it did work in this occasion. The IPCA did an investigation which was` which reached the appropriate conclusions and resulted in recommendations to the commissioner, which have been accepted and have put in` have been put in play with regard to a change` the changes that they've asked for. Whether there is a debate to be had about how the IPCA works, what legislative framework there is, those sorts of things, that's not for me to discuss. I just want to leave the people with the assurance that this system does work. It's for the police and the other stakeholders to it to make it work. And tonight we can tell you Constable Moore has graduated with a new dog, and Tank ` he's used only on armed offender call-outs now.