| MadMax |
Posted
on 21-Jul-02 04:37 PM
SOURCE: http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,4720049%255E21222,00.html
Bad behaviour not suited to a court of law
By Cindy Wockner
July 17, 2002
EARLY this month, when the final in a series of gang rape trials involving two brothers was getting under way, Judge Michael Finnane was moved to say this to the young men: "I am not going to have the place [court] turned into a three-ring circus."
It was one of many times the judge was forced to admonish the rapists - and sometimes their family supporters - over their in-court behaviour.
In this instance, he was referring to a complaint about one of the brothers laughing and smiling while the victim was testifying.
Throughout the four gang rape trials, which began in November last year and ended this month, the youths sometimes acted as though the whole court process was some sort of sick joke.
The family of two brothers who featured in both trials this year had, throughout the trials, professed their sons were innocent, victims of a police set-up and of racism within our legal system.
Indeed, the mother of these two males was herself charged with perverting the course of justice in relation to the horrific August 30 six-hour rape of an 18-year-old woman. The charges were later withdrawn.
At the end of one trial, late last year, one family member professed loudly in Arabic that it was not a crime to f... a white slut.
As well, in one of the trials, while Crown Prosecutor Margaret Cunneen was cross-examining one of the accused men, his family members sat in the back of the court, reacting angrily to the questions and referring loudly to Ms Cunneen as a "slut".
Because the trial was held in a court where the court body and the public gallery are separated by thick glass, these unsavoury comments, and others like them, were not audible to those inside the court - a great pity, because Ms Cunneen and the judge deserved to hear them, said in the sneering and derogatory tone in which they were uttered.
Many of the utterances, followed by loud laughter, were in Arabic, meaning most of us were unaware of the full extent of the commentary.
The Daily Telegraph
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