Vigilante style Police publishing – cost taxpayers $25,000

Peter Cowan, then senior sergeant of Kilbirnie Police published information about Barry Grant Brown, a convicted paedophile on parole after serving 3 1/2 years of a five-year sentence for kidnapping and indecently assaulting a five-year-old boy as Mr Cowan was worried about the proximity of Brown's flat to schools and playgrounds.
There had been several cases where adverse events had followed police publishing or leaking information about paedophiles. They included a paedophile's sister having rocks thrown through the windows of her Christchurch home and Blackball residents hounding a convicted paedophile out of town.

Wellington District Court judge Robert Spear found the Kilbirnie police officer had breached police guidelines when he arranged the leaflet drop in 2001 and awarded $25,000 damages last year after police used a leaflet drop to alert residents in the area.