justice as quickly as was reasonably practicable. On the other hand, if he is detained, not for that purpose, but solely for the purpose of questioning him, the detention will be unlawful. The line may be a fine one, as it often is when a discretion has to be exercised in sensitive matters.Justices Mason and Brennan said:The right to personal liberty is, as Fullagar J described it, "the most elementary and important of all common law rights" (Trobridge v Hardy (1955) 94 CLR 147, at p. 152). Personal liberty was held by Blackstone to be an absolute right vested in the individual by the immutable laws of nature and had never been abridged by the laws of England "without sufficient cause" (Commentaries on the Laws of England (Oxford), Bk.1, pp. 120–121, 130–131)... The right to personal liberty cannot be impaired or taken away without lawful authority and then only to the extent and for the time which the law prescribes.Justices Wilson and Dawson said:A person is not to be imprisoned otherwise than upon the authority of a justice or a court except to the extent reasonably necessary to bring him before the justice to be dealt with according to law. That, as we conceive it, it one of the foundations of the common law.As a result, the decision of the Tasmanian Court of Criminal Appeal was set aside, and the verdict of acquittal on the 26 charges was restored. There is an onus on a person under Section 34A(1) of the Justices Act 1959 Tasmania, to be brought before a justice as soon as practical once taken into custody for an offence. In the ordinary case of an arrest on suspicion, the arresting officer must have satisfied himself at the time of the arrest that there are reasonable grounds for suspecting the guilt of the person arrested although the grounds of suspicion need not consist of admissible evidence. If the arresting officer believes the information in his possession to be true, if the information reasonably points to the guilt of the arrested person and if the arresting officer thus believes that the arrested person is so likely to be guilty of the offence for which he has been arrested that on general grounds of justice a charge is warranted, he has reasonable and probable cause for commencing a prosecution. References External links [1986] HCA 88, record of proceedings at the