Criminal and Traffic Lawyers for Hornsby Local Court

Our client is a 36-year old tradesman from North Western Sydney.

He was at a hotel in the Sydney CBD when he entered into a conversation with a 25-year old female.

Both had already been drinking, and they drank a number of further alcoholic drinks together, before catching a taxi together to our client’s apartment.

While there, the female exchanged text messages with a female friend to the effect that everything was ok and for her friend not to worry.

The next morning, the complainant sent further text messages to her friend to the effect that she had been forced into having sexual intercourse.

She left our client’s home, met her friend and they both attended a police station where a formal complaint of sexual assault was made. In the complaint, the woman alleged that the pair were drinking on a couch at our client’s apartment when he forced himself on her and had non-consensual sexual intercourse with her. She claimed she had stated ‘no’ several times and attempted to ‘fight off’ our client.

The complainant attended a hospital during which an examination was performed and samples taken.

Police attended the home of our client several days later where they arrested him, placed him in custody and conducted an interview during which our client was adamant the sexual intercourse was consensual.

Police nevertheless charged our client with one count of sexual intercourse without consent (also known as ‘sexual assault’) under section 61I of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW) and one count of detain for advantage under section 86 of the same Act.

They refused him bail at the police station and we made a successful application in court the very next day.

Based on our client's instructions, we quickly subpoenaed CCTV footage from the hotel and from our client’s apartment complex, and managed to track down and obtain in-car footage from the taxi they took to our client's premises– all of which were highly suggestive of the complainant being a willing participant in the events leading up to the pair entering our client’s unit.

We also relied on photographs of our client and the complainant which showed no evidence of any struggle.

We wrote detailed ‘representations’ to the DPP – who eventually took the case over from the police – to the effect that neither of the offences could be proved beyond reasonable doubt on the admissible evidence available. Representations are a formal letter requesting the withdrawal of charges.

We followed up our representations with extensive negotiations with the DPP, after which both of the charges against our client were withdrawn, saving our client the stress, expense and potential risk of a lengthy District Court jury trial.

The Presiding Magistrate in Hornsby Local Court has dismissed the AVO brought against our client by his neighbour, and then ordered him to pay our client's legal costs.

Our client and the applicant are next door neighbours in the northern suburbs of Sydney. They have been engaged in various disputes for over 4 years.

The applicant alleged that our client had "harassed and intimidated" him and his partner "at least 15 times" over a one-month period by "prying" on them, "making videos" and "using abusive language" both in-person and in text messages.

Our defence team prepared transcripts of all text messages, obtained relevant videos and arranged transcripts of those videos, gathered photographs and prepared witness statements - all of which undermined the applicant's version of events.

The case ultimately reached a defended hearing wherein it became abundantly clear during the applicant's lengthy cross-examination that he was primarily responsible for escalating the disputes, not our client.

The Presiding Magistrate was scathing in her criticism of the applicant as she dismissed his case and ordered him to pay our client's legal costs in full.

Police have withdrawn the charge of Reckless Wounding and AVO (domestic violence related) against our 26 year old client after our defence team prepared two detailed sets of written submissions requesting withdrawal and pushed relentlessly for the case to be dropped.

The charge and AVO arose from an incident on 17th May 2014 when our client stabbed her partner in the leg with a 20cm long kitchen knife causing a large open wound requiring hospitalisation and sutures.

Our client maintained that her actions were undertaken in self defence after her partner threw a mug and then advanced upon her.

The case was scheduled to go to a defended hearing in Hornsby Local Court, but police have decided to drop the charge and the AVO rather than pursue the case in court.

Our client is now spared from the stress and expense of defended proceedings.

It is yet another example of 'domestic violence-related' charges being dropped through hard work and perseverance.

The Presiding Magistrate in Hornsby Local Court dismissed drug possession charges against our 21 year old client from Wahroonga who was stopped and searched in a Pennant Hills carpark.

Police approached our client claiming he appeared to be 'acting suspiciously' by standing outside his car with a friend in an unlit area.

As usual, police alleged that our client appeared 'nervous' and 'agitated' and that he could not adequately explain why he was there.

They searched him and found 4 ecstacy tablets and a small amount of cannabis in resealable bags in his pocket.

The Magistrate found that this was not enough to ground a 'suspicion on reasonable grounds' and ruled the search to be illegal.

The evidence was then excluded and both charges were dismissed.

The Magistrate in Hornsby Local Court upheld our 36 year old client's court election against a LIDAR-detected ticket for speeding by more than 15km per hour on Pennant Hills Road, Pennant Hills.

Police issued the ticket based upon a reading from the hand-held device just after 3.45pm on a weekday.

Our client was adamant that he was not speeding and wished to dispute the ticket.

A photo served upon our office shortly before the hearing date supported our client's instructions that there was heavy traffic at the time and it could have been another vehicle that was speeding.

He gave evidence to that effect on the witness stand, and the Presiding Magistrate ultimately accepted our submissions that the reading could have been for a vehicle that was in the lane beside our client's or could otherwise have been inaccurate due to the number of other vehicles on the road at the time.

In Hornsby Local Court, Sydney Criminal Lawyers® persuaded the Magistrate not to convict our 45 year old Chatswood client who smashed the window and assaulted another driver in a 'road rage' incident, leaving his face cut & bleeding.

Our client was of previous good character and having great difficulties in his life leading up to the incident. He was concerned that a criminal conviction would have prevented him from obtaining further employment in his chosen profession.

In Hornsby Court, Sydney Criminal Lawyers® had all charges dismissed against a 40 year old Greenwich man accused of multiple indecent assaults against a 27 year old woman.

After lengthy cross-examination by Mr U. Nedim, it became clear that the complainant had lied to police by stating that she has not been in an intimate relationship with our client and that the pair were not intimate on the day of the alleged assaults. CCTV footage was played in court which showed that she was intimate with our client in a shopping centre and later in a hotel. Our client always maintained that the sexual acts were consensual. He was vindicated during the hearing.

After the charges were dismissed, the Magistrate was persuaded to order police to pay legal costs in the amount of $7,700.00 on the basis that they failed to properly investigate the incident; in particular, they failed to obtain any CCTV footage despite the defence requesting that they do so.

The defence obtained the footage by issuing subpoenae to the owners of the shopping centre and hotel, and that material was crucial to discrediting the complainant.

All charges were dismissed our 40-year old client after the magistrate found that he did not know, and 'could not reasonably have known' that police were pursuing him.

Our client was riding his motorcycle on en route to Canberra from Sydney. Police activated their lights and siren from a distance of approximately 100 metres behind our client.

Police alleged that, upon their sirens being activated, our client increased his speed to over 160kph and attempted to evade them for approximately two kilometres.

Our client was adamant that he did not see the police nor hear their sirens, and that he pulled over immediately upon seeing them alongside his bike.

Police refused to withdraw charges of 'police pursuit' and 'speed by more than 45kph', and the matter proceeded to a defended hearing in Hornsby Local Court.

The magistrate was "unimpressed" by police testimony in relation to speed and our client's alleged conduct. In particular, police did not record the speed on a radar device and the magistrate was not satisfied they could see our client looking into the bike's small rear-view mirror.

Her Honour came to the view that our client's testimony was credible and dismissed all both of the charges against him.