Tuesday, May 5, 2020

Implementation and Development of Complex Alcohol Control Policies

Question: Discuss about the Implementation and Development of Complex Alcohol Control Policies. Answer: Introduction The legal advice to be provided is with respect to the application of law of evidence based on the facts of the case scenario provided. The advice is not a general one. It will cover certain vital aspects of the case scenario. Within the advice one has to determine the information regarding the evidence that could be provided or presented before the court regarding the matter from the side of both the prosecution and the accused. The relevance of the evidence will also have to be determined. The possible challenges and issues that could be claimed by either party to the case have to be comprehended. It is necessary to determine the steps that would be taken by either party to the case with respect to making certain evidences usable and admissible before the court. It is also necessary to determine which evidence cannot be used in the court or rather inadmissible evidence. Other issues arising from the evidences have to be discussed at length. The scenario used here is purely hypothet ical in nature and does not bear any resemblance with real cases. From the present case it is seen that there were one accused. On being arrested, he refused to speak with the police initially. The case scenario also says that when the accused was brought to the police station, they had asked for a lawyer. The facts also suggest that a lawyer was nominated to deal the case on their behalf. The accused was put in a holding cell. The case clearly suggests that a court hearing is yet to occur. The accused are thus considered as under trial. It seems that an independent accused agreed to give evidence against the other accused. The bargain was that his charges would be reduced if he agreed if his evidence sufficed in the court. She was present in the same holding cell where the other accused were present. From the instant case it is apparent that initially when the accused were informed about the statement of Sydney Smith, he refuted Sydneys statement claiming that she was lying and he had no part in the crime for which they were accused. The facts sug gest that Sydney Smiths statement was video recorded as per the requisites present in Police Powers and Responsibilities Act 2000 (Qld). The facts suggest that when the police tried for the third time to elicit statements from the accused, he did not agree to have a conversation with the police like the first instance. From the facts of the case it can be inferred that there was a security camera near to the scene of the crime. It had captured images and pictures of an individual who had similar features to that of the accused near the scene of the crime. This is in terms of height, build, colour and gender of the accused. In spite of all these similarities, it is shown that the face of the individual was not clearly visible in the video. To bring a solution to this issue, certain solutions were thought of by one of the legal team of the prosecution lawyers. The team mentioned about a seminar conducted by Dr Carla Andrade regarding the use of biometric markers for identifying the accused. Now it is important to analyse the statement given by Sydney Smith through video recording. She asserted that on the day the accuse d was brought to the local police station, she was also present in the same holding cell where the accused was placed. Smith was an under trial prisoner. Her charges were several including illegal use of a motor vehicle and non compliance of directions by the police to stop the motor vehicle. According to the police the charges with respect to not following police instructions could be dropped if she cooperated in the present or any other case. One of the constables also said that if Smith was able to induce the accused to speak with her regarding the charges, the police would help in reducing the charges of Smith. From the statement it seems that the witness in this case was happy and voluntary to give the statements. She gave the opinion that the accused seemed to be a dangerous individual. According to Smith, she had approached the accused to talk about the offence. Initially he received a cold shoulder from the accused. He was not keen to speak with Smith initially. Smith also said that the accused made this statement that he would be flashed on the news regarding the crime. However the accused was confident that the police would not be able to keep him in jail. The accused seemed to be confident that the police would not be able to prove anything regarding him. The accused claims that there were no witnesses to prove that he was the person who did the crime in the crime scene. However, according to Smith, the accused admitted of doing the crime. The accused was sanguine that he would be absolved from the charges since he was careful at what he did. Smith also claims that after accepting the crime, an hour later the accused told Smith that if she reveals anything, the accused would deny the facts. Smith also claims that the accused called her a wierdo. Smith also clai ms that she is suffering from Tourette syndrome. The problem includes syndromes like twitching and making of noises. She claims that it was beyond his control. However she asserts the fact that this physical issue does not impact upon her intelligence and other aspects. Evidence that can be put forward by the defence before the court The statement of the video recording will prove to be vital. This is because very less information could be derived by the police when they interviewed the accused. On the first and third occasion of the interview, the accused simply kept quiet and refused to answer any question raised by the police. On the second occasion of the interview, when the police mentioned to the accused about the video statement provided by Sydney Smith, he vehemently refused to accept the authenticity of the statement and claimed that he was innocent and had no role in the crime for which he was accused. The evidence that can be used by the prosecution to prove the guilt of the accused is the video footage from the security camera in the place of the crime. However it seems that there is no real evidence of the fact that the accused person was actually the person involved in the crime shown in the video footage. The only proof that the prosecution has regarding the possibility that the accused could be th e person shown in the security camera is that the height, build, colour and gender had a great resemblance with that of the accused. The biggest problem that the prosecution will face is the fact that the face was clearly not visible in the camera. Thus it is suggested that the video recorded statement and the transcript of the video statement provided by Sydney Smith should be brought in front of the court. The nature of the statement and the admissions sound to be valuable and could be used by the questioning officer against Sydney Smith. The prosecution in the instant case has major evidence in terms of the video recording of the statement given by Sydney Smith. Sydney Smith can also be used as a special witness for providing testimony on the first trial of the case before the court. It can be proved by the prosecution that when the accused was placed in the holding cell, Sydney Smith was present in the same cell. The video which came up on the video camera can be brought before the court by the prosecution during the course of the trial. The point on which the prosecution can argue before the court regarding the image that was captured by the security camera is that the features of the accused has a great resemblance with the build, height, gender and colour of the person seen in the video footage. Forensic reports from the DNA Lab could be used by the prosecution to establish before the court that accused is responsible for the crime that was committed. Issues that could be brought up by each side of the case with respect to the evidence Firstly the issues that the prosecution can bring in with respect to regarding evidence forwarded by the defence will be discussed. The accused had challenged the authenticity of the video statement of Sydney Smith. However they can use the video footage available at the scene of the crime. If the biometric markers match with the features of the accused, it would be sufficient to suggest that the accused was involved in the crime. The prosecution might also question the fact that the accused stayed quiet in front of the police whereas he opened up before Sydney Smith. The defence on the other hand has more issues that could be raised against the evidence forwarded by the prosecution. The accused can claim before the court that just by proving that the biometric markers available from the video footage matched with that of the accused does not prove the fact that he was present in the scene of the crime. There could be several other individuals who have similar physical attributes similar to him. The mere use of biometric markers could just be a hunch. Moreover, he can claim the fact that Sydney Smith made up a story to receive benefits of reduced charges. He can claim that there was no video footage of the conversation between Sydney and the accused. The mere statement made by Sydney Smith could not be used as authentic evidence. Procedures that could be followed by the prosecution and the defence to prove the evidences forwarded by them to the court to be admissible The evidences that were used by the prosecution against the accused were the video statement and the transcript of the statement given by Sydney Smith as well as the security camera video footage of the crime scene. First the prosecution has to justify the involvement of Sydney Smith as a witness against the accused. Sydney Smith can be used as a vulnerable witness. This is a broad term to discuss a wide range of witnesses in case of both criminal and civil proceedings. The witnesses include adolescents and children, sufferers of sexual assault, individuals with learning and mental disorders and impairments etc. Vulnerable witnesses also include individuals suffering from emotional trauma getting intimidated and are unable to give evidence. This particular example suits with the problem suffered by Sydney Smith. Vulnerable witness also includes an accused who acts as a witness in his own defence. This is with respect to an accused that has learning disorders. Moreover as per the Evid ence Act 1977 of Queensland, vulnerable witnesses can be classified into various categories. This includes special witnesses, protected witnesses and affected children. The provisions regarding special witness is mentioned in section 21 A of the Evidence Act 1997 of Queensland. Sydney Smith qualifies to be considered as special witness. If the court considers him to be having some sort of mental or intellectual disorder and as a result of which is disadvantaged to be a witness, he can be treated as a special witness. From what is seen from the facts Sydney was intimidated by the behaviour of the accused and also suffered from emotional stress and trauma. Thus the prosecution can use the provisions of section 21 A to make sure that Sydney is considered as a special witness. Once Sydney qualifies to be considered as a witness, further elaboration can be made to prove the elements of being a special witness. The prosecution can also use section 21A (2) of the Act to ensure the safety of Sydney Smith. The prosecution can ask the court to seclude the accused while Sydney testifies before the court. There should be a person appointed and approved by the c ourt to be present while Sydney provides testimony to give her emotional support. Other than the direct testimony of Sydney, there should be permission to display the video statement and its transcript for further clarity of evidence. For this the conditions mentioned in an order has to be followed. However, the prosecution should also keep in mind the provisions section 21A (4). This provision allows the accused to hear and see the testimony given by the special witness. The applicability of video statements as evidence is mentioned in section 21A (2) (e) of the Act. According to the provisions of this section the court has the right to use video recording of a special witness in place of the direct testimony of the special witness. The accused can claim the right to remain silent during police interrogation. This right is justified in the sense that it would protect the accused from self incriminating himself. In this way the accused will be able to justify the refusal on his part to give any statement to the police. The accused can ask the court if there were any actual witnesses present in the crime scene that could testify as to the guilt of the accused. He can claim the unreliability of the statement provided by Sydney Smith. He can claim that the statement given by her is fabricated to falsely implicate him for the crime. He can claim that Sydney did not have the mental capacity to be qualified as an admissible witness. He can claim that she must have cooked up a story to exonerate herself of her own charges. Moreover, there was no evidentiary proof whether there was a conversation held between the accused and the witness. There were no security cameras nor were there any person video recording their conve rsation. Hence there was no concrete proof as to the ingenuity of the statements provided by Sydney. Inadmissible evidence The fact that the security camera at the scene of crime could not take a clear picture of the person is a worrying factor for the prosecution. There is no concrete evidence of the accused being present in the scene of the crime. The police were not able identify any mark or tattoo present on the body of the accused which matched with the person identified in the video recording. There is a mixed reaction as to the admissibility of expert opinion of Dr Carla Andrade. The requirement of expert evidence can be seen in the case of Murphy v R (1989) 167 CLR 94. As per the case an expert evidence is required if the evidence is beyond the ability of interpretation of the jury. Conclusion From the instant case it may be concluded that the evidences are more in favour of the accused compared to the prosecution. Bibliography Aldridge, M,Vulnerable Witnesses(The Routledge Handbook of Forensic Linguistics, 1st ed, 2010) Blewer, R, "Making Kiddies At Home In Court: Supporting Child Witnesses In Twentieth Century Australian Courtrooms" (2017) 4lawhistory Braun, K, "Legal Representation For Sexual Assault Victims-Possibilities For Law Reform" (2013) 25Current Issues Crim. Just Buckleton, J. S., J. A. Bright and D Taylor,Forensic DNA Evidence Interpretation(CRC press, 1st ed, 2016) Clough, A. 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