Christchurch biker wrongly convicted of rape gets $350,000 compensation

[FJRider]

If this is true then surely Farmer has a case against his defence for completely fucking up. Could be worth another 350k

He would need to take a civil court law-suite against those laywers .... he can afford to now ...

The police have their faults on the street but I do believe the majority are good people (if they weren't we would really be up the creek) and a few bad eggs spoil a good name for the rest. But to really fuck up justice requires higher level thinking that exists in the lawyers offices.

Are we still talking about Police ... or mototcyclists ... and a few of those think they are laywers .... (if you [or they]believe what they say)

[jonbuoy]

Yep, luckily we know the whole story eh...

No we don´t - but does anybody? There must be a reason for him being freed. Whats worse - letting a guilty man walk or putting an innocent man in jail?

[FJRider]

No we don´t - but does anybody? There must be a reason for him being freed. Whats worse - letting a guilty man walk or putting an innocent man in jail?

Where is the "saving the butt of the guilty one" ... (and NOT the FOUND GUILTY one) option .... ???

[RDJ]

Oh, you know all about this case on the o.p. do you??

(All the FACTS that is)

Or are you just trolling??

I know what is in the public domain, therefore as much as you do I assume - as you would not be privy to 'inside' information.

[scissorhands]

Associate Justice Minister Nathan Guy unreservedly apologised to Farmer yesterday.

“New Zealanders on the whole enjoy a fair and effective criminal justice system. However, the system is not infallible,” he said.

This is a scary case. An innocent man got sent to jail on such flimsy evidence. Even without the DNA evidence, he should never have been found guilty beyond reasonable doubt.

I suggest people read the report by Hon Robert Fisher QC. It is only 20 pages, but damning. He says:

In summary, it has to be said that even before turning to the various obstalces to the Crown’s case, the positive evidence upon which it relied was remarkably thin. It relied upon nothing more than a visual identification by the Complainant of a kind that is notoriously unreliable and some rather unremarkable coincidences.

Fisher also notes six inconsistencies between the rapist and Farmer. Plus the notoriously unreliable visual identification had the victim say she was only “90% sure it was him”. When did 90% sure become beyond reasonable doubt?

Generally the test for compensation is that on balance of probabilities the person is innocent. In this case, Fisher has concluded that Farmer is “innocent beyond reasonable doubt”. This makes it all the more a worry that he was ever found guilty between reasonable doubt.

[scissorhands]

Fisher has concluded that Farmer is “innocent beyond reasonable doubt”. This makes it all the more a worry that he was ever found guilty beyond reasonable doubt.

Hon Robert Fisher QC obviously does not know all the facts!





http://justice.govt.nz/publications/..._download/file

[Metastable]

To the OP;
This story is very saddening. Personally I think the greatest injustice that can occur is convicting an innocent person. IMO, it is better to let a guilty person go, than to convict and innocent individual. On that note, it bothers me that Crown and prosecutors around the world often do not strive to find true justice, but rather try to get the "WIN" regardless of reality. I think this bankrupts justice.

As for Asperger's syndrome, thanks for that enlightening post. Although I have heard about it, I didn't know much. I wonder if you can clarify for me why Aspies get picked on more than other folks? i.e. does it happen by folks who don't know an Aspie, or is it generally done by individuals who do know the person, then take advantage of them? I guess what I am getting at is how would a person an Aspie has never met know any better? I would never guess Britten was an Aspie, although I do remember reading about it.

Thanks for the post!

[MSTRS:Me]

Oh, you know all about this case on the o.p. do you??

(All the FACTS that is)

Or are you just trolling??

Are you saying the cops got it right, and Farmer walked (eventually) on a technicality?
Or can you just not admit that the Farce isn't god?

[scissorhands]

I didn't know much. I wonder if you can clarify for me why Aspies get picked on more than other folks?

Many reasons I'd say. At an primordial unconscious level, an aspie is perceived as a variant to the group, an outsider, stranger danger. It invokes a strong response in some neurotypical people. Eventual ostracising from groups is not uncommon, everyone in agreement that he was 'a dick'.

Dr Spock from Star Trek (and Data) are extremely popular, yet both are iconic aspergian types. Though in reality if Spock was there with you always contradicting your errors, finding logical fault with emotional responses, pointing out to bully's how their comments are wrong and unfair.....Its fuck off time!

Going on and on and on would be my biggest complaint. I am fortunate enough to acknowledge and mitigate this in myself, though not always and i can annoy people to fuck. One mate who is a cruiser always got so stimulated by my rhetoric he needed to crap within 10 min of my company.

Mostly though it is an unconscious recognising of the genetic weakness that the autist would endanger the gene code/health of the group pack. Group consciousness is a product of survival of the fittest at play. The fit survive, those with disability are not chosen to mate and to further the chance of survival for the entire group, are shunned by alpha males or group leaders and matriarchs too toward female aspies. Many mammalian groups do this, and if many aspies did breed it would be problematic to the packs survival in a primitive setting anyway. Now aspies make excellent coin and can become attractive enough to mate. Hence, a global increase in autism, computer related careers are ideal for aspergian brains. We will continue to gain favour as the world moves forward with technology. Eventually aspie may surpass neurotypical in many areas...

Or, the wolves keep the caribou herd strong by killing the sickly and old caribou, as you would understand in Canada


Interestingly though, and watch this space..... this is a worn out dialetic that causes so much inefficiency and well its often just plain dumb to be constantly fighting off males when you could be studying something worthwhile....

Competition in man must give way to cooperation for the planets survival. The primitive survival coding is effective, but not without fault.

I like the Hindu society model, where everyone has a place (far more inclusive and allowing of variants), and if Aspie comes from Thinking class or Brahman class or engineer class.... to not marry but serve the neurotypical breeders as shaman, priest or prophet who knows for sure eh?

One thing, any competant business man would relish a rhode scholar right hand man to comment intellectually on all business activity, as Star Trek's Captain Kirk had Spock, and in the politically correct 90's the new Kirk had a woman adviser on all matters emotional.....

Bill Gates is aspergian so he has himself, as does Warren Buffett?, Richard Branson?

If natural selection does rule humans in the future as it has in the past, high functioning aspergian brains may have an increase in advantage due to the importance of technology.

Many lower functioning autistics are going to waste, at present society in non inclusive, yet many offer savant like behaviours that in some conducive types could be channelled into productive and positive endeavours and outcomes.

But sadly, the more autistic you become, the less able you to earn money, build self and breed successfully.

And you probably shouldnt breed anyway, if you are unable to survive in the world. So says natural selection...

[oneofsix]

I hope scissorhands would allow for one critical fault in the Hindu system in that whilst everyone has there place their place is decided by their birth rather than their ablities. If you were born to an untouchable you are an untouchable, a lot like the colonially despised British class system.
Poor Mr Farmer was screwed as soon as he was picked up because he would not have displayed the "appropriate" and "usual" responses.
Aspergian types are nice people with frustrating habits.
I think the only thing I like about Shortland Steet is the actress protraying the Asperius surgeon.

[avgas]

Farmer said he would like an explanation from the woman who made the accusation.

That would be my fault too. While the cops fucked up - there is always one whom starts the chain of events. And its usually a woman

[scissorhands]

We shouldn’t be alarmed that cases like Farmer’s are resulting in guilty verdicts we should be alarmed they are getting to court at all, because even an eventual “not guilty” verdict means the accused’s life has been made sheer hell for months (if not years) and they’ve been stripped of every penny to pay an often barely competent lawyer.

In fact those who are imprisoned wrongfully often end up better off, financially speaking, than those found not guilty because a spell in prison is seen as worth compensation whereas months of hell being investigated and then with a charge hanging over your head isn’t.

We need to compensate the wrongfully accused as well as the wrongfully imprisoned.

We need to sack every officer found to have acted with malice or reckless disregard for the facts in laying charges.

We need to charge, convict and imprison every person found to have laid a false complaint – their time in prison to be proportionate to the time that would have been spent by the accused person if wrongfully convicted (e.g. lie and accuse someone of rape, you serve the same term as a rapist).

The prevailing attitude is that people like Farmer were “lucky” that their injustice was brought to light.

Even when an accuser says after that she’d been intimidated by police into making a false statement....

[scissorhands]

from http://www.starcanterbury.co.nz/loca...s-out/3948695/ 1hour ago

An autistic man wrongly convicted of rape says the promotion of a detective who misled him while he was being interviewed does not send a good signal to the public.

Aaron Farmer, 41, was found guilty of raping a 22-year-old woman in a Christchurch street in 2005.

He was sentenced to eight years in prison, but the Court of Appeal quashed his conviction in 2007. Shortly after, new DNA tests excluded Mr Farmer as the attacker. He was awarded $351,575 in compensation.

The detective, widely criticised by the courts and his superiors, has been promoted to senior sergeant. He now works in Wellington.

Police spokesman Jon Neilson would not comment about the promotion other than to say: He "applied for the job and got it".

Mr Farmer said "I'm not too happy. It's definitely not very good in the public eye."

He believed the detective should have received a pay cut, a demotion and formal disciplinary action.

Mr Farmer, a sickness beneficiary, was charged with rape after the victim picked him out of a photo lineup.

In prison, Mr Farmer wrote to the Court of Appeal protesting his innocence. In Feilding his mother Bev was also writing to politicians and authorities, which led to the appeal, and a written apology from the Government for her son's conviction.


Sundays Herald

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/crime/news...ectid=10719821

5:30 AM Sunday Apr 17, 2011

Aaron Farmer got a formal apology and $350,000 this week for the 27 months he spent in prison for a crime he didn't commit. Police consider the case closed, but it remains wide open - and it smells.

For one thing, whoever raped the woman Farmer was wrongfully convicted of raping in Christchurch in 2003 remains at large. Police are not investigating, presumably because the trail has long gone cold.

But the case raises deeply disturbing questions about police mindset and practice, which may not be easily dismissed. Associate Justice Minister Nathan Guy, who announced the compensation package this week, was at pains to emphasise that "we have a strong and fair justice system in New Zealand but occasionally it gets things wrong".

Assistant Police Commissioner Mark Burgess - who, as it happens, was the Acting District Commander in Christchurch during the period that the case against Farmer was being prepared - gave an equally bland response.

"We know that our interviews are subject to scrutiny," he said, "and the courts have told us 'Don't mislead suspects'. So to do it is just dumb."

His remarks referred to the fact that a detective told Farmer that his DNA had been found on the victim. It had not. And later, more sophisticated DNA testing specifically exculpated Farmer.

But Burgess' comment is a none-too-subtle piece of sophistry. It seeks to imply that the fault lay with that single officer, who has been sternly criticised by the courts and his superior but is still working for the police - though not as a detective.

The problem is that the Farmer case hints at a much deeper systemic failure. The Court of Appeal quashed his conviction, on the grounds that his lawyer had not presented potentially important alibi evidence, and ordered a retrial. When the new DNA evidence excluded him, the Crown dropped the charge.

Robert Fisher QC, who was engaged by the Ministry of Justice to advise on the matter of compensation, found that "[the] deceptive police conduct ... did not contribute" to the conviction. But much more damning was his conclusion that "the evidence positively supporting [Farmer's] guilt was particularly thin". Apart from the alibi evidence and the improbability of the timelines, he raised six separate and striking differences between Farmer and the rapist as he was described by the victim.

In other words, a single barrister quite easily spotted gaping holes in the police case which the police themselves had either missed - or wilfully ignored. Not only did Fisher draw the conclusion that Farmer was not guilty beyond reasonable doubt - a cornerstone of our criminal justice system - but that he had established his innocence by the same margin.

This is not, then, a matter of a single bullying cop attempting to bluff a suspect into a confession. The case against Farmer went across the desks of senior officers and Crown prosecutors, who pursued it despite its manifest and manifold implausibilities. And it has been almost four years since the Crown abandoned the case. That's a long time to wait for Guy's "strong and fair justice".

The prosecution, albeit unsuccessful, of Sergeant Martin James Folan on six assault charges can be seen as demonstrating a police commitment to call officers to account, and Folan still faces internal disciplinary hearings. But the Farmer case will do nothing to ease disquiet, particular when top brass seek to make light of a serious - and apparently cynical - failure to do the right thing.

[Metastable]

Very interesting.... if it is any consolation, this sort of things happens a lot in many places. Our police forces have been dealt a few black eyes in the last while. Two of the worst included a tasering of a Polish speaking man and his subsequent death, completely unnecessary and the death of a motorcyclist hit by a Drunk Driving cop (very close to cop's house) who left the scene and walked back to the scene while drinking alcohol, so that he couldn't get convicted by a blood/alcohol test.

BTW you used the wrong emoticon ..... a snowflake would have been a better one today.... I can't believe we are STILL getting snow!!!!

[scissorhands]

Coldest day of the year here in Auckland. Must be only half a year or so that you can ride a motorbike in some parts of Canada?

I dont really want to harangue the police with every mistake every officer has ever made.

More than anything, I would like to see some training of police when dealing with suspects who are neurodiverse.

It appears to me that Aaron Farmer was a victim of bullying.