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The Christchurch Civic
Creche Case |
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A "Criminal Cases Review
Commission" must be put in place as soon as possible to rectify
miscarriages of justice, peterellis.org spokesperson Brian Robinson
says. Such a commission, recommended by
Justice Thorp over a year ago has the backing of Parliament's justice select
committee, and was enthusiastically received by a Law Conference over a year
ago. The Bain case provides yet another
example of why such a commission should be formed. And yet a
spokesman for Justice Minister Mark Burton said on Friday that it was not
even being considered. Mark Burton has previously made the surprising excuse
that New Zealand is "too small" to allow such a safeguard. New Zealand's current appeal
system has been finely tuned to assure trial procedures follow the rules of
law. We urgently need an independent authority that can consider the more
fundamental question of guilt and innocence. If we really are "too
small" to have our own commission, as Mark Burton has suggested, New
Zealand should seek to participate in the British, or similar commissions
elsewhere
and present, of the New Zealand
sex abuse moral panic"
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