Sajid Mehmood in the Auckland Distirctr Court for sentencing after being found guilty of assaulting two female customers in his Ola taxi cab. Photo / Alex Burton
A former ride share driver who assaulted two female customers has been denied a chance to work as a security guard despite claiming he’s being punished twice for the same offence.
Sajid Mehmood, 50, was convicted in the Auckland District Court in September after he indecently assaulted two young female customers on separate occasions in 2021 and 2022.
Mehmood already held a Certificate of Approval which allowed him to work as a security guard. However, since his conviction police applied to have his licence cancelled.
The authority this week released its decision opting to cancel Mehmood’s licence despite his objections that his offending was at the lower end and that working in security is the only job open to him.
He also claimed that cancelling his licence amounted to “double jeopardy” where he’d essentially be punished twice for the same set of offending. He also argued that police’s complaint didn’t have a valid basis and was a breach of the Human Rights Act.
According to the summary of facts read in court at his sentencing, Mehmood victimised a 19-year-old woman and a 33-year-old in two separate incidents that happened on New Year’s Eve 2021 and 10 days later in January 2022.
He picked up each of the women in his Toyota Prius after they hailed a cab via Ola, a mobile phone app that directly competes with Uber.
When the first victim got out of his car he shook her hand and pulled her towards him and asked “Can I?” The woman said “No” before closing the door.
In the second incident he picked the woman up at 4am and suggested her skirt looked similar to native Pakistani garments and touched her knee under the pretence of touching the fabric. He then moved his hand further up her leg to her thigh.
Mehmood was sentenced to 200 hours of community work and nine months’ supervision for the offending.
Mehmood claimed that his offending wasn’t violent but Private Security Personnel Licensing Authority chair Trish McConnell said that while he didn’t physically hurt the two victims he did cause emotional harm to them.
“Such an argument is not only inconsistent with the definition of an offence of violence under the Act but also minimises the nature of Mr Mehmood’s offending,” she said.
His lawyer, Farrukh Gul Qaisrani, argued that cancelling his client’s licence would be a breach of the Bill of Rights and would essentially be punishing him twice for the one offence.
“The disciplinary process of the authority is not retrying Mr Mehmood for his offending. The key question to be determined is whether Mr Mehmood’s offending makes him unsuitable to be a certificate holder. This is a stated consequence of his convictions rather than repunishing him for his offending,” McConnell said in response.
“It would be a nonsense to reinterpret this section to be consistent with the Bill of Rights Act in the way suggested by Mr Qaisrani. It would mean that a security guard’s certificate could never be cancelled following a disqualifying conviction or sentence no matter how serious.
“It would also mean that no other professional disciplinary body could ever cancel a person’s licence or practicing certificate following a conviction.”
McConnell said that the grounds for disqualification had been established and that she might have considered a short-term suspension if Mehmood had been more experienced as a security guard.
She said while Mehmood’s offending occurred as a ride-share driver it demonstrated a breach of trust and a lack of understanding of professional boundaries and how to interact with young women.
“I am not convinced Mr Mehmood fully appreciates how inappropriate his interactions were with the two women victims,” McConnell said.
“This in turn raises concerns about whether he would interact appropriately with young women while working as a security guard.”
Mehmood also submitted that while he had held a certificate for nearly seven years he’s never worked in private security but his doctor had cleared him to do light work.
McConnell said he had an unrealistic expectation about the rigours of security work and said it was not “stress and tension free”.
Ultimately she sided with police and opted to cancel his licence with the condition that he must finish his sentence before reapplying with clearance from his doctor, any prospective employer and having completed security training.
Jeremy Wilkinson is an Open Justice reporter based in Manawatū covering courts and justice issues with an interest in tribunals. He has been a journalist for nearly a decade and has worked for NZME since 2022.
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