Crime law reform question (1 Viewer)

[lolzlolz]

Can anyone help me with answering this question:
To what extent has law reform been effective in achieving justice within the criminal justice system

 

[erin_4school]

i second this

 

[its_ace21]

i second this

i have a paragraph on bail with law reform if u want that?

 

[erin_4school]

i have a paragraph on bail with law reform if u want that?

yes please! anything helps x

 

[erin_4school]

also i was wondering if you had any tips for how to do well in legal?

 

[its_ace21]

yes please! anything helps x

Bail is the temporary release of an accused person awaiting trial, sometimes on particular conditions. Initially, the Bail Act 1978 (NSW) used a system of offence based presumption for and against bail, where the focus was the nature of the crime rather than the accused. While this maintained society's level of protection, many people were ending up in remand due to fear of re-offending, which further showcases the ineffectiveness. This can be seen in (Compelling statistics: how many innocent people on remand? 2009 straight statistics) which found that from 2007 to 2009 there were 12,000 people on remand found innocent which showcases a lack of protection of individual rights. Moreover, following a review undertaken in 2012 by the NSW law reform commission, the Bail Act 1978 (NSW) was repealed and replaced with the Bail Act 2013 (NSW). This removed the 'offence based presumptions' and introduced an unacceptable risk test, stating factors that may deem an individual as a risk to society in order to meet community standards. These included expressing the nature of the crime, and seriousness of the crime. This allowed Man Monis to be granted bail despite violent offences at the time of the Lindt cafe siege which clearly showcases the ineffectiveness of this Act as he was released on bail only 6 days after the reform was introduced. Moreover ‘R vs Hawi (2014), who was granted bail despite murdering Anthony Zervas at Sydney Airport, led to the Bail Amendment Act 2014 (NSW), which brought back the offence-based presumption for over 900 offences and introduced the show cause test, to 'ensure greater safety for our community’, as the decision did not accord with community standards and led to further distress and fear for the victim’s family, with the victim’s mother as shown in the SMH article by Bibby, 2013, stating: “I feel sick and I feel scared”, in response to Hawi’s release. The effectiveness of this amendment is further reflected in R v Gountounas 2017, in which he was rejected bail after applying the show cause test, as the accused was a large drug dealer who had considerable evidence placed against him. This reflects the tension between community interests and individual rights, but resolved it in a way that sufficiently respected individuals' rights in a way that would be acceptable to the community. Thus, the constricted accessibility to bail under recent reforms has excessively sacrificed the rights of suspects to ensure community security, limiting the effectiveness of the criminal investigative process in preserving justice, and reflecting the moral and ethical standards of society.

Juries are an integral part of the justice system as they reflect society's moral and ethical standards whilst upholding the accused's right to be judged impartially by a group of their peers. Their conduct must comply with the Jury Act 1977 (NSW), which states that jurors must limit themselves to the information presented at trial and must not make any inquiries or disclose information outside the courtroom. The case of R v Skaf 2004 highlights the issues surrounding juror misconduct as it had emerged that 2 jurors in one of the trials had against instruction gone to the scene of the alleged crime to assess lighting conditions at night. The NSW Court of Criminal Appeal found that the experiment was a miscarriage of justice and ordered a retrial as it constituted juror misconduct which essentially goes against the rights of the offender. As a result, largely, of this case, the Jury Amendment Act 2004 (NSW) was passed, amending the Jury Act 1977 (NSW) by adding s68c which states that 'making inquiries about trial matters is punishable by 50 penalty units and/or 2 years imprisonment'. This encouraged compliance and resource efficiency, as punishments compel society to be deterred away from misconduct when serving on juries whilst also upholding the accused's right to a fair trial. However, there has been no real consideration on how effective the penalty provisions might be as 'we have simply no idea whether the deterrent effect of penalties will prevent independent research or merely make it harder to discover when it has occurred, as jurors may be influenced by their media research and background checks': Legislative Developments in 2004 the Public defenders. However, the recent observations by Judge McCallum in the ACT sexual assault trial of Bruce Lehrmann, which was aborted due to juror misconduct, are telling. She stated that the conduct "would amount to an offence" in New South Wales, and "that it is beyond question that the conduct of the juror is such as to abort the trial": Knaus, The Guardian, 2022. This suggests that having laws in place, as is the case in NSW, may at least allow for greater enforceability and for rogue or reckless jurors to be held accountable for their actions. Ultimately, the reforms in NSW to the Jury Act can be seen as responsive and quite effective in reflecting the moral and ethical standards of society, as they provide for both better enforceability and encourage better compliance with the Jury Act 1977.


Mandatory sentencing in the area of assaults resulting in deaths by intoxicated individuals and standard minimum non parole periods for certain crimes have been moderately effective reforms. It refers to a minimum sentence requirement imposed by parliament onto courts for certain types of crimes. After Thomas Kelly was killed by Kieren Loveridge, who struck him fatally while intoxicated in Sydney in 2012 (as well as assaulting others), it resulted in Loveridge being sentenced by the Supreme Court to a minimum 5 years 2 months jail. The community and the Kelly family was outraged at this inadequate sentence, as shown in the 2013 smh article Kieren Loveridge’s sentence shocking, Thomas Kelly’s parents say, with the result being that the parliament responded by passing the Crimes (Assault and Intoxication) Act 2014, which made it so that such offences would result in a minimum of 8 years in jail. The DPP also appealed the term against Loveridge, with the result being that the CCA increased the minimum term to 10 years 2 months. Furthermore, this law was applied in the 2017 Garth case in which he was sentenced to a minimum of 10 years jail for assaulting and causing the death of Ray Manalad while intoxicated. This outcome demonstrates the kind of enforceability and alignment with community standards the parliament envisaged when making the law and therefore increasing justice for victims and their families. Mandatory sentencing reforms have also taken place within the Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Act 1999 with the Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Amendment (Standard Non-parole Periods) Act 2013 which applied to standard non-parole periods for certain crimes if they fall into the middle range of seriousness (or worse) for that type of offence. An example of this is murder of a police officer which is a minimum 25 years jail. This was spurred on by the 2007 Taufahema case (and others) in which the defendant participated in the shooting and killing of police officer Glen Mcenally and received a minimum 8 years jail for manslaughter, outraging the victim’s father and resulting in criticism by then premier O’Farrell as seen in the ABC article ‘Police killer should have got life’ . However there has been criticism of mandatory sentencing by the Law Council of Australia who said that it “can actually create greater law and order problems''. Notwithstanding the criticism, or the fact that the Appeals process can correct inadequate sentences on occasion such as the Loveridge case, mandatory sentencing reforms, such as those discussed, provides consistency, better enforceability and a greater alignment with community standards, thereby increasing justice.


these were separate paragraphs from different essays so u'll have to reword them a bit and maybe find newer sources

 

[its_ace21]

also i was wondering if you had any tips for how to do well in legal?

spam mc and hr questions from past hsc/trial papers and other schools (theres a bunch since the syllabus is so old and a lot of times questions are repeated), then try to share lcmdi/judgement over a range of syllabus dot-points so its easy to memorise and then essentially practice a bunch of crime/option essay questions and ask ur teacher for feedback. Also dont leave everything till the last minute

 

[erin_4school]

Bail is the temporary release of an accused person awaiting trial, sometimes on particular conditions. Initially, the Bail Act 1978 (NSW) used a system of offence based presumption for and against bail, where the focus was the nature of the crime rather than the accused. While this maintained society's level of protection, many people were ending up in remand due to fear of re-offending, which further showcases the ineffectiveness. This can be seen in (Compelling statistics: how many innocent people on remand? 2009 straight statistics) which found that from 2007 to 2009 there were 12,000 people on remand found innocent which showcases a lack of protection of individual rights. Moreover, following a review undertaken in 2012 by the NSW law reform commission, the Bail Act 1978 (NSW) was repealed and replaced with the Bail Act 2013 (NSW). This removed the 'offence based presumptions' and introduced an unacceptable risk test, stating factors that may deem an individual as a risk to society in order to meet community standards. These included expressing the nature of the crime, and seriousness of the crime. This allowed Man Monis to be granted bail despite violent offences at the time of the Lindt cafe siege which clearly showcases the ineffectiveness of this Act as he was released on bail only 6 days after the reform was introduced. Moreover ‘R vs Hawi (2014), who was granted bail despite murdering Anthony Zervas at Sydney Airport, led to the Bail Amendment Act 2014 (NSW), which brought back the offence-based presumption for over 900 offences and introduced the show cause test, to 'ensure greater safety for our community’, as the decision did not accord with community standards and led to further distress and fear for the victim’s family, with the victim’s mother as shown in the SMH article by Bibby, 2013, stating: “I feel sick and I feel scared”, in response to Hawi’s release. The effectiveness of this amendment is further reflected in R v Gountounas 2017, in which he was rejected bail after applying the show cause test, as the accused was a large drug dealer who had considerable evidence placed against him. This reflects the tension between community interests and individual rights, but resolved it in a way that sufficiently respected individuals' rights in a way that would be acceptable to the community. Thus, the constricted accessibility to bail under recent reforms has excessively sacrificed the rights of suspects to ensure community security, limiting the effectiveness of the criminal investigative process in preserving justice, and reflecting the moral and ethical standards of society.

Juries are an integral part of the justice system as they reflect society's moral and ethical standards whilst upholding the accused's right to be judged impartially by a group of their peers. Their conduct must comply with the Jury Act 1977 (NSW), which states that jurors must limit themselves to the information presented at trial and must not make any inquiries or disclose information outside the courtroom. The case of R v Skaf 2004 highlights the issues surrounding juror misconduct as it had emerged that 2 jurors in one of the trials had against instruction gone to the scene of the alleged crime to assess lighting conditions at night. The NSW Court of Criminal Appeal found that the experiment was a miscarriage of justice and ordered a retrial as it constituted juror misconduct which essentially goes against the rights of the offender. As a result, largely, of this case, the Jury Amendment Act 2004 (NSW) was passed, amending the Jury Act 1977 (NSW) by adding s68c which states that 'making inquiries about trial matters is punishable by 50 penalty units and/or 2 years imprisonment'. This encouraged compliance and resource efficiency, as punishments compel society to be deterred away from misconduct when serving on juries whilst also upholding the accused's right to a fair trial. However, there has been no real consideration on how effective the penalty provisions might be as 'we have simply no idea whether the deterrent effect of penalties will prevent independent research or merely make it harder to discover when it has occurred, as jurors may be influenced by their media research and background checks': Legislative Developments in 2004 the Public defenders. However, the recent observations by Judge McCallum in the ACT sexual assault trial of Bruce Lehrmann, which was aborted due to juror misconduct, are telling. She stated that the conduct "would amount to an offence" in New South Wales, and "that it is beyond question that the conduct of the juror is such as to abort the trial": Knaus, The Guardian, 2022. This suggests that having laws in place, as is the case in NSW, may at least allow for greater enforceability and for rogue or reckless jurors to be held accountable for their actions. Ultimately, the reforms in NSW to the Jury Act can be seen as responsive and quite effective in reflecting the moral and ethical standards of society, as they provide for both better enforceability and encourage better compliance with the Jury Act 1977.


Mandatory sentencing in the area of assaults resulting in deaths by intoxicated individuals and standard minimum non parole periods for certain crimes have been moderately effective reforms. It refers to a minimum sentence requirement imposed by parliament onto courts for certain types of crimes. After Thomas Kelly was killed by Kieren Loveridge, who struck him fatally while intoxicated in Sydney in 2012 (as well as assaulting others), it resulted in Loveridge being sentenced by the Supreme Court to a minimum 5 years 2 months jail. The community and the Kelly family was outraged at this inadequate sentence, as shown in the 2013 smh article Kieren Loveridge’s sentence shocking, Thomas Kelly’s parents say, with the result being that the parliament responded by passing the Crimes (Assault and Intoxication) Act 2014, which made it so that such offences would result in a minimum of 8 years in jail. The DPP also appealed the term against Loveridge, with the result being that the CCA increased the minimum term to 10 years 2 months. Furthermore, this law was applied in the 2017 Garth case in which he was sentenced to a minimum of 10 years jail for assaulting and causing the death of Ray Manalad while intoxicated. This outcome demonstrates the kind of enforceability and alignment with community standards the parliament envisaged when making the law and therefore increasing justice for victims and their families. Mandatory sentencing reforms have also taken place within the Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Act 1999 with the Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Amendment (Standard Non-parole Periods) Act 2013 which applied to standard non-parole periods for certain crimes if they fall into the middle range of seriousness (or worse) for that type of offence. An example of this is murder of a police officer which is a minimum 25 years jail. This was spurred on by the 2007 Taufahema case (and others) in which the defendant participated in the shooting and killing of police officer Glen Mcenally and received a minimum 8 years jail for manslaughter, outraging the victim’s father and resulting in criticism by then premier O’Farrell as seen in the ABC article ‘Police killer should have got life’ . However there has been criticism of mandatory sentencing by the Law Council of Australia who said that it “can actually create greater law and order problems''. Notwithstanding the criticism, or the fact that the Appeals process can correct inadequate sentences on occasion such as the Loveridge case, mandatory sentencing reforms, such as those discussed, provides consistency, better enforceability and a greater alignment with community standards, thereby increasing justice.


these were separate paragraphs from different essays so u'll have to reword them a bit and maybe find newer sources

you are so amazing! thankyou x