Many years ago in Melbourne, a 14 year old girl went swimming at the City Baths. Afterwards, while she was waiting to catch a tram, a man came up to her and threatened to shoot her unless she went with him. He took her away and raped her. 

This was the substance of the lawyer’s address to the jury: “She didn’t complain. Did you think she wasn’t provocative; did you think that any young girl would stand on a street corner and attract that sort of attention? She was flaunting herself at the baths!”

The client was acquitted. His lawyer, as many do, went on to high judicial office. He has now retired…and is therefore able to confess that “after years of contemplation and education” he thinks that she was the only 14 year old girl that he has ever seen that looked 11. And that she had never been asked for, or made, a decent complaint because of the trauma of the matter. And he acknowledges that the “system, with my skills, allowed the most appalling injustice, as far as the girl was concerned”.

If you really want to know the name of that retired judge you can read it in the November 1997 issue of the Law institute of Victoria’s “Law Institute Journal”. But his name does not really matter. What does this tell us about the likely fate of victims as they venture into criminal courts to put themselves into the hands of barristers and judges who have not yet indulged in “years of contemplation and education” about the workings of the criminal justice system?  Have they all repented and changed their ways? If so, they are not telling us!

Most people get their perceptions of the justice system from TV. Judge Judy seeks out the truth in an active way which is horrifying to our “non-interventionist” judges. On TV criminal defence lawyers never lose. Their clients are never in the wrong. They never behave unethically in the secrecy of their law offices (perhaps that has something to do with the cameras). The subject of fees is never mentioned, even though the lawyer seems to have very few, if any, other clients and seems to be very prosperous. But spot the ‘fairy tale’ clue. When the innocent client is acquitted there is a big sigh of relief from the client and smiles all round. A happy Hollywood ending. 

It’s all crap! When innocent people get acquitted they are not happy at all! Would you “happily” lose your life’s savings when you were innocent, and go off into the sunset praising the justice system?

I wrote Evil Deeds of the Ratbag Profession to explain to crime victims that criminal justice is all about defence lawyers making money by “getting off” clients who are as guilty as sin. This is how they know it…..and the public never sees this: 
The innocent few who get convicted (usually of minor offences such as fighting or obstruction which get little pre-trial “filtering”) thump the lifts of the court in frustration afterwards. The guilty ones accept conviction calmly, and acquittal with considerable satisfaction. 

Never believe a lawyer who says “I never know if my client is guilty or not!” If it is true the lawyer is incompetent. It’s the lawyer’s JOB to know. A successful defence lawyer’s job is to know more about the case than anyone in the court room, because one can’t twist the truth unless one knows exactly what it is, first. 

Once the money starts flowing, the defence lawyer does whatever it takes to deliver an acquittal. Just like that judge did. And given that nearly all clients are guilty, an acquittal can only be delivered by denying justice to the victim. 

As if victims have not already lost enough. If all that is not evil, then tell me what is.

Brett Dawson, 1999