Man denied freedom because he maintains his innocence

An officer during his younger and more adventurous days gets involved in group sex with a young girl who he maintains was "up for it".

He gets thrown in prison and applies for parole - but gets denied because he didn't apologise.

The question is why should he apologise for something that he maintains he did not do? Apparently for him to say that she was up for it and that he didn't do anything wrong is percieved as arrogant by the parole board. They are effectively forcing this man to admit his guilt. The fact that he maintains his innocence at a time when he knows that admiting guilt and saying sorry might actually help him out should at least tell us there is a slight chance this guy is telling the truth.

All this based on a woman's accusation relating to a "rape" that happened almost 2 decades ago.....shocking.

/face palm

In NZ?

R

considering how easy our parole boards are implied to be... this guy must truely be a bad arse... and I hope his fellow inmates are making full use of that

meanwhile another policeman from the same generation gets off a rape in CHCH

rob - www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10504434&ref=rss

...and one girl 'who was up for it' now lies on a mortuary slab in Chch after her body was dredged out of the Waimakariri

another day in the life...

you won't EVER get parole unless you show remorse (some people are better at faking it though)

this is why Tamihere never got parole - he continued to maintain his innocence and of course then it is impossible to accept guilt/remorse!

Ellis the same

what's your take on this? Seems unfair on the surface but I guess it's the natural outcome of a system that has to believe it makes the correct judgements at all times?

He's a rapist who won't accept what he did.

It's called denial. If you remain in denial, you are NOT rehabilitated as the court believes you did what they said you did - it's irrelevant what you said.

BTW virgo1 supporting a rapist? You have really fallen through the floor now... disgusting. Go fight against American imperialism in Baghdad.

that's right - it's the direct corollary of our system

what the system would say is "well Mr Tamihere, you can prove your innocence through the normal legal processes eg appeals - otherwise yes you are guilty!"

the trouble is, like any human system, it's a flawed system and our appeals process is not good enough to always deliver justice

there are ways of expressing remorse without outrightly admitting guilt though. we had a client who was jailed but claimed to be innocent and whilst incarcerated (even before then actually) he exhibited a high degree of insight into his behaviour which he accepted was vulnerable to criticism and could appear to be criminal in nature when it may not have been intended to be. in other words he accepted he made mistakes but did not accept he was guilty of a crime. he got parole.

remorse is a matter of nuance. one can be sorry without accepting point blank that they have committed a crime or have been rightfully convicted.

that probably does not make a lot or sense, but it's Friday night and i'm spent heh

Interesting.

Accepting you made mistakes which are not related to the crime is not remorse. If you didn't commit the crime and are jailed anyway - it means you were found guilty, not that you mus accept you did it.. because you didn't.

Does what you said above imply that being open to admitting one's faults makes you more parolable - when the person may think they didn't do it.

..I think it's a bit weird that the ownership of a crime is a consideration to parole boards for the reason the badder a person or the longer their sentence they are more likely to just say what the parole board wants - on instruction from their lawyer - to get paroled. So the worst people are rewarded proportionately more (with freedom) for showing further poor behaviour (lying).

The re-jailing rate in NZ is very high - maybe it's partly because the parole system gets the mickey taken out of it daily.

R

Mean to say:



R

interesting example

he obviously showed a lot of insight into the behaviour which manifested in the (alleged?) criminal offending, thus convincing the parole board

It's a very subjective and unscientific process and the nuances of every case are different

not supporting the guy, I have no idea whether he did it or not so I'm neither for him nor against him. I'm simply against the particular method which the parole board is using to decide whether he should be eligible for parole or not.

it was a sex case, where consent was the contested issue. he accepted that perhaps he never should have gone there in the circumstances but would not accept that there was no consent. so his insight and remorse related to his behaviour but did not involve an admission of the crime.

so you're a criminal barrister then?

justhanging is a criminal barrister.
i'm just trying to be one

How do you find dealing with those types of people day in, day out? I mainly do family law and most of my clients are legally aided, I find it quite draining at times dealing with their issues.

I work for a senior counsel so we don't do legal aid. It's mostly indictable crime, but we don't just do crime, we do civil work as well. It can still be draining when you are representing a client who is facing serious criminal charges, but the cases I work on are often really interesting and quite complex, so I enjoy it.

I <3 family law, but mostly in the academic sense. I would find working in family law quite difficult and draining, as you say.

How senior is senior? I sent you a pm...

Is justhanging a lawyer too?

Dazed and Confused got a fright when he saw me at his current work (I was just doing employment law then on a fixed term contract).

What year of lawschool were you?

Sorry about all the questions!

believe me - she means senior!

can't really get more senior

as BG said I am working as a criminal barrister but I do mostly legal aid work, not much indictable crime, and I'm also on the duty solicitor roster

I won't go on the Bill of Rights roster however because I value my sleep too much

I always thought legal aid paid jack for family law but duty solicitor takes the cake!

The extent of my criminal appearances are two limited licenses. heh

JH is a REAL lawyer. As in court room stuff. He doesn't protect the rich from the masses. He's as admirable as a lawyer can get.

BTW I'm reading "English Legal History" so I can own you all with something to do with the disempowerment of native Anglo-Saxon law by the Normans next time we have an argument...


I reckon JH should become a legal officer for the NZDF.

Seems illogical.

The court has ruled that behaviour A is a a crime. So we can use the representation A = B (where B stands for a crime).

Now, if he is expressing remorse for A, then he MUST be expressing remorse for B as they are equal.

The ONLY way would be for him to directly challenge that A=B, which is what the court has ruled on.

I applied for a legal officer position but that was straight out of uni and I didn't have the experience they wanted.

Vad...

The behaviour which is a crime is that he slept with her without her consent(A), and the court has ruled that this happened, he still disputes this however. A is the same as the crime itself(B). He is saying that his behaviour was perhaps bad in the circumstances but did not amount to a crime as there was consent (C). A and C are quite different. He is still contesting that there had in fact been a crime but did admit that his behaviour was 'dodgy'.

(apologies if I got that wrong BG, I read all of what you said earlier in the day and right now am only referring to vad message)

He is expressing remorse for C rather than A.

limited licences

i.e. stand there and say nothing *rubber stamp*

"as the court pleases"

assuming all the paperwork was in order - don't want any nasty surprises

re duty solicitor roster: almost impossible to get on now - reliable income - hourly rate should be more but it all adds up

aw shucks vads

actually I thought you hated ALL defence lawyers - but glad you are making an exception for me - at least for now

p.s. btw I'm sure you would own me on that topic - my legal history is pretty crap actually

p.p.s NZDF legal officer .. hmm there's food for thought.

well first one I did the Judge told me off...a renowned grump.

vad..I think you'll find that all of the lawyers posting on here are 'real' lawyers within your definition. I appear in the Family Court, but then I guess you might not consider that a 'real' court.

The court has ruled that his behaviour was a crime.

That is set in stone.

He is saying he expresses remorse for his behaviour.

Now, either he: admits he has committed the crime (accepts the court's ruling), or denies that his behaviour was a crime (challenges the court).

The court has ruled there was no consent. If he says there was, then he is challenging the court's authority.

i read this as a compliment to JH, which it obviously is.

BUT if you are suggesting for one second that what I do or more importantly what my boss does with my assistance is not REAL lawyering, then you need to check yourself. 1) We are appearing in court all the time. 2) We act for and represent people who are facing criminal charges, often very serious criminal charges 3) A lot of those people are in fact innocent of the crime and crimes they are alleged to have committed 4) Just because we get paid for what we do does not mean that we don't work fucking hard to make sure justice is achieved, and 5) Just because we have paying clients as opposed to legal-aid clients really means jack shit about how admirable or not what we do is.

As you were...

Ooooh this sounds interesting, what's the BORA roster?

Yeah that's sort of correct. He did not accept that he was guilty of a crime but did accept that in hindsight perhaps it would have been better if he had not gone there because he could see how his behaviour could be misunderstood and it would have spared the victim's ordeal as well as his own...

thought this might provoke a reaction

BG I am assuming that Vads' issues lie primarily against corporate/commercial lawyers whose job it is to protect the status quo and enhance the wealth of these clients

anyway I'm just grateful that he has stopped hating on defence lawyers as a class and he can actually see the value of this work (esp in relation to the disadvantaged/impoverished)

they might as well call it the drink drive roster because that's mostly what you get. simply a list of those lawyers who have said they are available to give advice to defendants who have just been arrested. free of charge. over the telephone but also at the police station day or night. bugger that for a joke. get paid $30 a call or something. some lawyers do it to get clients but they don't always stay loyal and change lawyers once they get to court.

So he was usurping the right of the court to determine that his behaviour was criminal. As you were.

It's not rocket science, BG.

BG I'm going to explain this very simply.

We live in a capitalist environment. What this means is that the entire system is designed to privilege and protect the rich. Statistics show how low the arrest rate is for people from higher socio-economic areas. Now, to afford the services of your boss, the client has to be rich.

We thus have the following:
- it is very difficult for the rich to be arrested
- you protect the rich

If we collate the two, we can see straight away that for a rich person to have even REACHED the point of a trial, the evidence etc must have been of a far greater weight than that which might be used against a poor person. And yet you continue to defend them!

Which of course merely serves to perpetuate those same inequalities within society.

Now, you cannot possibly challenge my points. The rich are already sufficiently protected through the old boys network, the education, and the money; you add yet another layer for them. While the poor suffer.

Vad...legal aid is a nightmare. A bureaucratic, low paying nightmare.

He is not usurping the right of the court to determine his behaviour is criminal. He just doesn't agree with what the court found. The two are different.

People from lower socio economic areas commit more violent crime vad.

The court has the right to determine that his behaviour was criminal. At that point, for all purposes, the behaviour and the crime are the same thing. Thus if he expresses remorse for the behaviour, he is also expressing remorse for the crime. It is not his right to determine whether the behaviour is criminal or not.

If A=B and I say "I like A" then I am saying "I like B". It's fucking basic logic mang.

He is saying his behaviour was other than what the court found (ie he is saying she consented, court says she didn't), but it was still bad behaviour nonetheless.

He is expressing remorse for the bad behaviour, which in his eyes, was not criminal.

Which means he is usurping the right of the court to rule!!!

I'm not quite sure why you made that comment

yes we all agree that it is - but the vast majority of criminal defendants are poor/from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds

if there was no legal aid and/or no lawyers wiling to participate in the legal aid system, the whole criminal justice system would grind to a halt

I just typed out a longwinded response but actually I've been thinking too much today. Time for my brain to switch off ...I'm not thinking straight.

g'night.

fair enough!

We need to bring back the Icelandic justice system. I've said it before

where are you getting this idea that we only act for the 'rich'? our civil clients are well-off and some of our fraud clients are too but most of our criminal clients i would not describe as "rich". sure they are not homeless or totally impoverished but most don't have much more than a house they live in and a car by way of assets.

the idea that we somehow protect these people from the masses by making sure that they get good representation, a fair hearing and that ultimately there is a just outcome is seriously warped.

and we do legal aid work, not a lot of it, but we do it.

you don't really know anything about what I do vadinho or who we act for. you probably know only what you've read in the paper which is not at all representative of the practice. and so you are raving and ranting from a totally uninformed perspective and frankly I'm a little tired of your continuous attacks on my profession. i suggest you fuck off with your futile attempts to run down me or my boss or what we do. he is in fact a noble and admirable man, a lawyer that even the revered JH might look up to. you on the other hand are uniformed and pathetic.

Exactly. An offender does not have to accept an outcome, because indeed courts do get it wrong every now and then - shock horror.

There is little point arguing nuances like this with vadinho, he sees the world in black and white.

so has this replaced the usual method of post-arrest legal advice where the offender who does not already have a lawyer is given a list of available counsel that he/she can contact for advice?

i have to say i'm a little surprised that they are expecting this to be done 'free of charge'

and the contested issue here, ie that of consent, is an issue which can be very much a 'grey' area.

Vad is just trolling bellamys, I wouldn't worry about it.

no it is that list - administered by the Legal Services Agency - it's just that people refer to it by different names

it's free of charge for defendants

lawyers invoice the LSA and are paid for example $30 per phone call

I think it's a big sacrifice from those practitioners involved given that you could be woken up at any point during the night and be expected to give lucid and accurate advice to sometimes drunk and abusive defendants

I see. At least they get paid for it though, I though for a moment this was some kind of a volunteer scheme! lolz

I couldn't do it. I'd expect one would get very little sleep on a Fri and Sat night...

junior doctors are expected to save lives under similar conditions

oh lookee here



http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10506369

night...that situation is hardly like the gang rape of a young woman in a lifeguard tower.

that the guilty parties still maintain was consensual sex

and that proves that it was consensual?