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Why apply for suppression?

  • October 12th, 2009

I have no idea who’s been charged nor any inside information about the case, but I wonder if the accused has really thought through his name suppression application in the case headlined "Senior public servant on assault charges".

"Prosecuting lawyer Paul Dacre told the court the teenage victim had taken credit cards belonging to the defendant’s wife and withdrawn $700 from an ATM, spending $200 of that on a cellphone, cigarettes and a bag.

On finding the victim the defendant grabbed him and walked him back to his car, threatening to break his legs if he tried to run away, Mr Dacre said.

Once in the car he punched the victim five or six times, with one blow hitting him in the head, he said."

If the facts are as alleged  and the punches did the "victim" no permanent injury the guy who caught the victim should rise enough in public estimation to outweigh any loss. Why worry about the opinion of the kind of people who would think worse of him.

The consequences of conviction might be serious for his career, but at least he should collect the benefit of public approbation.

Comments

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  • F E Smith
  • October 19th, 2009
  • 12:37 pm

Where I work, describing someone before the Court as a ‘public servant’ or ‘civil servant’ is code for ‘police officer’.

The only other reason we usually see for that type of description is where the defendant works in an occupation that touches on criminal justice or the effects of it.

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  • Gabes
  • October 28th, 2009
  • 10:13 am

Could not agree more!
However the case that interested me in this suppression farce was a certain Wellington Sportsman that got off being named and shamed a month back, what was even more incredulous was that his sport got a pass as well, it seems that you can threaten a woman in a public place but if you play a certain sport in this country the take by the court is well ‘Boys will be boys’. Because it is supposedly part of the lifeblood of our country….I guess there is nothing like being able to wear the old Tie into court and get a wink and a nod and out the door.
The Player should not have been able to walk away as easily as he did the charge was serious, yet total name suppression for player and sport…Yet the same day another sportsmans name was all over the same paper for a lesser incident.
Doesn’t take much to work out who really is running this country, role models my backside.

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