Boy Shafted by Prosecution and Own Defence Lawyer
Imagine this: you are a 15-year-old boy brought into the police station for questioning about a stabbing murder which occurred during a fight between two groups of young males. Due to your age, you are given a ‘support person’ who...
Overcoming the Bail Act’s ‘Show Cause’ Test
The Bail Amendment Bill 2014 introduced important changes to the existing bail regime in New South Wales. Most significantly, the amendments brought-in what are referred to as the ‘show cause’ provisions. The amended bail legislation, through the insertion of Section...
Sydney Grandmother Faces Execution
Mrs Nguyen Thi Huong looked anguished as the court in Ho Chi Minh City read its verdict recently. The 73-year-old Vietnamese-Australian woman has been sentenced to death for heroin trafficking. It sounds implausible … incongruous, but Vietnamese community leaders in...
SCL Wins Criminal Defence Firm of the Year for Second Year Running
The SCL team is proud to be awarded ‘Criminal Defence Firm of the Year in Australia’ for the second year running. Global Law Experts is the world’s leading specialist online publication for locating legal professionals globally. In administering its yearly...
RIP Presumption of Innocence: Bail Laws Getting Tougher Nationwide
We have written extensively about our state’s tough new bail laws, which have seen the NSW prison population skyrocket, causing overcrowding and associated problems. NSW is not the only state to get tough on bail – similar trends are being...
Australian Body Needed to Investigate Wrongful Convictions
Legal experts have called for the establishment of a new national body to investigate possible wrongful convictions, which would work in a similar way to the review body in the UK. Flinders University law lecturer Bibi Sangha believes such a...
Accused ‘Home Invasion Killer’ Released on Bail
Accused ‘burglar killer’ Ben Batterham says he is ‘very relieved’ to be out of custody, after being granted bail by Magistrate Robert Stone in Newcastle Local Court yesterday. Battherham was granted bail on a $200,000 security. He will need to...
Tough Bail Laws Cause Rise in Imprisonment Rates
New statistics reveal that the adult prison population in NSW grew by a staggering 9% between April 2015 and March 2016, and is now sitting at a record high of 12,390 inmates. While overall crime rates in NSW have fallen,...
Pair Refused Bail on Charges of Financing Terrorism
A 20-year-old man and a 16-year-old girl were recently arrested in Guildford on charges of financing terrorism. Counter-terrorism police allege that the pair were involved in obtaining money to send overseas to assist ISIS. Police claim the 16-year-old schoolgirl has...
NSW Government’s Attack on Civil Liberties
The New South Wales Government has attracted widespread criticism from civil liberties groups, after passing new ‘anti-protest’ legislation in parliament this week. The new laws, passed on Tuesday, will see increased penalties for protesters at mining and coal-seam gas sites,...
