Too horrific for words - Moko Rangitoheriri case
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<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="jegga" data-cid="578587" data-time="1462864541">
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<p>Shaun Metcalf , there was thread about him when he tried to come back to the Warriors . It wasn't just Endacott saying that either, Selwyn Pearce said some stupid shit too. Metcalf should have got a life ban , the only reason they did that to the girl was because he didn't want a baby getting in the way of his league career .</p>
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<p>Yeah that's him, thought someone would remember. Ah well, Russell Packer beats the shit out of someone and comes back to first grade, no harm, no foul. Morons playing, and running, "our game".</p> -
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="SammyC" data-cid="578591" data-time="1462866486"><p>
I sent an email to Pearson when it happened, basically saying how disappointed I was in the punishment and his comments regarding the case.<br><br>
To his credit I got a very lengthy reply back within 24 hours, but most of it was bulshit.</p></blockquote>
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Good on you. -
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="aucklandwarlord" data-cid="578545" data-time="1462859462">
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<p>One of the biggest downsides of the government cutting funding to Crown Law (the private law firms who prosecute high end cases on behalf of the Police/public) is that there has been massive restructuring within these firms, leading to staff being cut and them having to run the same amount of cases on less than half of the budget they previously had. </p>
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<p>This has lead to enormous pressure being put on them and the Police to resolve cases prior to court, because jury trials are viewed as lengthy, costly and often rolling the dice as to whether or not a guilty result will be obtained. The huge downside to this is that defence lawyers generally know this and suggest ridiculous resolutions (such as the one above). This is most often seen in drug dealing and violence cases though, not murders and certainly not child abuse.</p>
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<p>I'm still scratching my head as to how the manslaughter pleas got accepted by the Crown/Police though. Absolutely disgusting</p>
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<p>Believe it or not, the legislative definitions of culpable homicide, manslaughter and murder are basically the same as in the Criminal Code Act 1893 and Crimes Act 1908 - we haven't seriously updated what murder is in over 120 years other than removing the partial defence of provocation (which reduced the offence to manslaughter).</p>
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<p>Not to justify the plea bargain, but actually getting a conviction for murder in the pattern of abuse cases seems to be really hard e.g. Delcilia Wittika. I can see, given the outcomes of previous similar cases, why they would take a definite conviction for manslaughter if that's the likely outcome anyway.</p>
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<p>Given the age of our laws around culpable homicide, it might be time for an update to take these types of cases into account...</p> -
Did anyone watch the interview with the mother last night? I didn't as I don't think I could have stomached it (and I didn't want to risk throwing something at my mrs's tv). I did take one look at her facial tattoos and think some pretty harsh things, was I being too judgy?
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<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Rembrandt" data-cid="580232" data-time="1463430358"><p>Did anyone watch the interview with the mother last night? I didn't as I don't think I could have stomached it (and I didn't want to risk throwing something at my mrs's tv). I did take one look at her facial tattoos and think some pretty harsh things, was I being too judgy?</p></blockquote>
I thought the same but it turns out she scribbled on her face after her kid was killed as some kind of self harm. -
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Rembrandt" data-cid="580241" data-time="1463434366">
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<p>Definitely too judgy then.</p>
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<p>I doubt many people would look at someone with facial tats and not make some kind of judgment.</p>
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<p>There is a programme on TV (no idea what channel) that Mrs TR watches (I listen and then catch the odd snippet while doing the dishes) hosted by that English women that had acid chucked on her face, and is about people that are correcting things on their body and then some that are gonna do things to their bodies...some of the reasoning is just odd.</p> -
<p>I didn't watch the news thing, but how did the kid come to be in the care of the two who killed him? Were they CYFS foster parents or was it just an informal kind of arrangement?</p>
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<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="aucklandwarlord" data-cid="580327" data-time="1463450126">
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<p>I didn't watch the news thing, but how did the kid come to be in the care of the two who killed him? Were they CYFS foster parents or was it just an informal kind of arrangement?</p>
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<p>According to this: <a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://m.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11640777'>http://m.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11640777</a></p>
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<p></p><p></p><blockquote class="ipsBlockquote">Moko's mother left him in the care of her friends Tania Shailer and David Haerewa in Taupo while she was caring for her older son at Auckland's Starship hospital for two months.</blockquote>
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<p>Informal arrangement with the mother.</p> -
<p><a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/faces-of-innocents/80123514/murder-charges-in-child-homicides-a-risky-bet-data-shows'>http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/faces-of-innocents/80123514/murder-charges-in-child-homicides-a-risky-bet-data-shows</a></p>
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<p>An informative article by Stuff on murder vs manslaughter charges for these types of cases including some data on court case outcomes and the factors involved in the decisions around which charges to lay and when to change them. Apparently, changing murder charges requires the Solicitor-General's permission.</p>
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<p>There's also an interesting point about Moko's case - one of the factors in changing to manslaughter was that the precise cause of death could not be established. Clearly, Moko died because of illegal acts, hence why manslaughter easily sticks, but if you can't point to which specific act caused the death, getting a murder charge to stick becomes a lot harder.</p>
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<p>It will be interesting to see where sentencing falls here - I can see life imprisonment, or a lengthy term of imprisonment, and either could be legally justifiable (there is no legal limit for manslaughter, but they tend to top out around 15-20 years).</p> -
Good article but what shits me is lawyers declaring at they are getting around problems when those problems and high burdens of proof were not the intent of the law in the first place, they have become that way through legal argument. <br>
This shit is like saying we aren't going to charge someone with dangerous driving causing death because that is harder to prove than speeding. <br>
The law once written becomes a self feeding beast. The law is written and passed by the representatives of the people but then becomes something that doesn't reflect what people wanted. <br>
When deliberate callous actions result in the death of an innocent child most citizens of our country call that murder. <br>
What's that line?" This isn't a court of justice son, this is a court of law" -
Any of the 3 main charges of driving (careless, dangerous and reckless -in that order) can have causing injury or death attached.<br><br>
Police would often reduce it from reckless to dangerous as the latter is easier to prove and in terms of the conviction, was very little difference, which was the bit that confused me. -
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="taniwharugby" data-cid="581710" data-time="1463943360"><p>
Any of the 3 main charges of driving (careless, dangerous and reckless -in that order) can have causing injury or death attached.<br><br>
Police would often reduce it from reckless to dangerous as the latter is easier to prove and in terms of the conviction, was very little difference, which was the bit that confused me.</p></blockquote>
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I'll come back to this thread when I have more time, but reckless and dangerous driving are covered in the same section of the Land Transport Act and have the same penalties so it's not a downgrade, legally speaking. Dangerous driving includes speeding if it's dangerous in the conditions, so that's probably why the police switch charges to that. -
If that's the case, then they are rarely enforced like that. <br><br>
Police always told us that they were 'only' charging someone with dangerous as it had an easier threshold to prove than reckless with the same penalty, as if reckless was the higher charge.<br><br>
Insurers have a clause that includes reckless/willful that would likely see them deny a claim if a charge of reckless were successful.<br><br>
My last job was somewhere that I saw people with these charges (and their story) cross my desk almost daily, and speed was rarely the determining factor between dangerous and reckless...in fact I think I only saw 1 or 2 reckless in 7 years (guy that fled from the police) yet a guy doing 205km an hour that flew off a motorway and rolled several times, walked out of the lounge of the house he crashed into got off with a 6 month suspension under dangerous driving... -
<p>The prosecutors see the desire for an easier conviction (fair enough) and in reality the punishments are not dissimilar. </p>
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<p>Problem is the message that is conveyed is that we don't take killing an innocent child by numerous beatings and starving as seriously as, say a gang member stabbing another gang member.</p>
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<p>Laws are meant to be in place to form the society that the members of that society want.</p>
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<p>I would think that 'we' want people who kill innocent children held to the highest possible account.</p> -
<p>another example I saw was a couple of young fellas were racing, plenty of witness accounts for well over an hour on a main stretch of road, one of them crossed the centre line and hit another vehicle killing the person driving.</p>
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<p>He got dangerous driving causing death or injury...reading the judges summary of facts made me so angry.</p>
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<p>Lost his licence, but then given he was on Home Detention for 6 of those months, he wasn't going anywhere anyway...judge also said Home detention is in fact harder for a person than going to prison, because you are a prisoner in your own home....</p>