Getting a Reduced Sentence for Providing Assistance
Where appropriate, criminal lawyers are required to advise clients that helping police with their inquiries may result in a reduced sentence. That said, lawyers are certainly permitted to explain the potential risks and requirements associated with giving assistance. For example,...
Electronic Frontiers Australia: An Exclusive Interview with Jon Lawrence
Since its establishment, Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA) has been one of the more influential, if not obscure, lobby groups in Australia. Founded in 1994, it’s been leading the burgeoning movement to secure what we now call “digital rights”, campaigning for...
Criminal Lawyer Punished for Pressuring Sexual Abuse Victim
Victorian criminal defence lawyer Alex Lewenberg has been suspended from practising law for 15 months and ordered to pay the Legal Services Commissioner $55,455 in costs after pressuring a complainant not to assist police in the prosecution of an alleged...
Degrees of Harm in Assault Offences
Assault charges are differentiated by a number of factors, including whether the act was done ‘recklessly’ or ‘intentionally’, and the extent of injury (if any) caused. ‘Common assault’ is an offence under section 61 of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW)...
Is Rugby League Rigged?
Stunned NSW Blues fans could not believe their eyes when the NRL bunker overturned two critical decisions by the on field referee in Wednesday night’s State of Origin opener, letting Queensland off-the-hook in the last fifteen minutes. Only 14 minutes from...
Police May Press Charges After Child Falls into Gorilla Enclosure
It’s the story that gripped the globe this week, and now US police have launched a criminal investigation into an incident at Cincinnati Zoo, which prompted zoo keepers to kill prized gorilla Harambe, after a young child climbed over a...
Police Commissioner Related to Officer who ‘Washed the Blood Away’
For four years, former police Sergeant Rick Flori has been fighting allegations that he engaged in ‘misconduct in public office’ - a criminal offence which carries a maximum penalty of seven years imprisonment – by leaking CCTV footage of four...
Honest Cop Fights On
Former Police Sergeant Rick Flori has been fighting to clear his name for more than four years. A Southport Magistrate has now ordered that his fight will continue – in a committal hearing late last week, Magistrate Michael Hogan ruled...
Judge Orders Barristers to Take Off Their Wigs
The barristers’ wig is slowly but surely becoming a thing of the past. Victorian Chief Justice Marilyn Warren has officially banned wigs across all courtrooms in the southern state, saying they are outdated and no longer relevant. The ban was...
Police Investigate Gay-Hate Murders
The New South Wales Police Force has launched an operation to re-investigate dozens of deaths between the late 1970s and early 2000s which it believes could be the result of gay-hate crimes. Operation Parrabell, a taskforce comprised of eight detectives,...
