The thief was caught by the police near the city gallery.

[rub mizrachi]

Hello,
I have a question about word order in passive voice transformations. In a school test, a student wrote:
The thief was caught by the police near the city gallery.
All the material is reviewed by the students before the exam.
The teacher corrected these, indicating that the "by + agent" phrase should be moved to the very end of the sentence (after near the city gallery and before the exam).
Is there a strict rule in English grammar regarding this? Who is correct here, the student or the teacher?
Thank you.

 

[5jj]

Both sentences are possible.

 

[probus]

There is no such rule.

 

[jutfrank]

When ordering elements in a sentence, different positions yield slightly different focuses, so both positions are possible depending on what you're focusing on, but all other things being equal, the 'by'-agent will naturally want to go directly after its verb, not at the end as your teacher says.