In this project, we learnt about the principles of justice that uphold Australia’s legal system, such as the presumption of innocence, an impartial judiciary, and the right to legal representation. I studied the case of Andrew Mallard, and analysed how these principles were both upheld and violated in this case. After writing an essay on the topic, we were required to incorporate feedback and edit the essay so that it was fit for online publication. This essay is the end result of that editing process. It demonstrates my ability to take feedback, and to refine a piece of written work to produce a professional result.

INTRODUCTION

Andrew Mallard who was 33 years old when he was accused and wrongfully found guilty for murder of Pamela Lawrence. In 1995, he was sentenced to a life imprisonment, he had fought for 12 years until he was free. Mr Mallard was exploited for his mental health state, having a drug addiction and bipolar disorder. The principles of justice were poorly upheld in his case, especially the rights to a fair trial and equality before the law.

EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW (trial and evidence)

Andrew was not upheld by the principle of justice ‘equality before the law’. The police had treated him unfairly and presented false evidence against him in court. The first piece of evidence was a video from Mallard’s 11 hour interview, this video stated Mallard predicting how Pamela was murdered but the police used it as his ‘confession’. This made him look like he told them how he had managed to commit the crime, while he was merely thinking of a theory. The second was a pile of police notes to which the police claimed was a confession. While investigating the murder, police had found that Mallards DNA did not match the DNA found on the crime scene. They chose to keep this vital information from his defence team. Clearly, this highly goes against the principle of equality before the law. The law, promising to be treated equally by any person of legal authorities, it was disappointing to see Mr Mallard be treated as he was.

EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW (interview)

Another part of the case which wasn’t supported by of equality before the law was Mallards interview and interrogation. The police, although knowing Andrew had a habit of making up stories, completely ignored all of this and used every single word he said against him in court. This definitely was an aspect that wasn’t supported by the principles of justice ‘equality before the law’. Andrew was treated unfairly and the police used his words, that have a great chance of being false, against him.

IMPROVEMENTS

Andrew should have been treated in a significantly better manner than what he was. The police should have been upholding their title by showing equality to everyone. Andrews mental state should have been taken into account while he was in the interview as well. An improvement for the future, monitoring the police as they operate, to ensure there is no misconduct and ensuring accuracy for the case. For t improvement in the future, people who have disorders or disadvantaged mental health which may affect the accuracy of the the case, should have a way of knowing what they are saying is true. This could be another witness agreeing with what they are saying. They shouldn’t be convicted on their words alone which may be false.

RIGHTS TO A FAIR TRIAL

Mallards trial was not upheld by the principle of justice ‘rights to a fair trial’. The judge was unfair to him to convict him based on two small pieces of evidence. Any other case would not have been treated like that which means there was a clear aspect of injustice. The judge leading his hearing must have had some sort of ally with the police officers at this point, to make Andrew seem guilty. This goes against the third principle of justice ‘all individuals have the right to an impartial judiciary’. Meaning that any judge in charge of a hearing should have no information about the details of the case before leading it. Andrew was clearly deprived of this principle justice as well.

IMPROVEMENT

For improvement in the future cases, judges are not meant to know any information about the case until it is presented to them at their trial and they should hear both sides of the case fully before giving a conviction. Having two randomized judges for a hearing is also a good idea, two heads are always better than one.

POLICE MISCONDUCT

Not having full proof of what the reason of police misconduct was we can assume that it was laziness. Andrew Mallard was their only prime suspect and fit all the ‘criteria’ and ‘evidence’ to have pulled off the murder of Ms Lawrence. This is an extremely poor display of the officially promised principles of justice and we hope to never see something similar occur again.

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CONCLUSION

Andrew Mallard was able to appeal to the high court and get his conviction, lifetime imprisonment quashed after a tough battle for 12 years. He was finally be able to get released in 2006. The investigation team found 2 policemen and a senior prosecutor guilty of misconduct. He also received a public apology from the head of the police force for the affect they had on his false conviction. He was given a compensation of more then $3 million for his jail time and being treated unfairly by the law. The laws, equality before the law and the right to a fair trial were very clearly not upheld.

I strongly believe no one should be treated this as Andrew Mallard was and I hope to see no false convictions in the future for our justice system. This is why the principles of justice are so important in our society, making sure it doesn’t ruin innocent lives, like Mr Mallards.

What we did (process)?

We all noticed that there was a lot of litter around the school and the community which made the community look messy. Most of this rubbish was plastic wrap that kids would have in their lunch box to wrap food. We wanted to do anything we could to stop this which brought us to make beeswax wraps, which is a substitute for plastic wrap. The first thing we did to get this business up and running was to make a prototype of the beeswax wraps. This took a lot longer than we expected as we needed to get the quantities right and we needed to test all different beeswax to see which was the highest quality. The first method we did was to iron the beeswax onto the fabric. Although this worked, we found that there was clumps of beeswax on some of the larger sizes as the iron can’t reach the corners. We didn’t want to sell faulty products, so we decided to try the oven version. This worked a lot better as we made them faster and they were better quality.

What have we learnt?

At the start of this journey, we were doing all the work during the innovated sessions which is once a week. We very quickly realised that we would have to do some of it in our own time. We started to make beeswax wraps in our own time which made us feel much more prepared and confident in our business. We have also learnt what type of fabrics we need to make the best products, for example, when the fabrics were predominantly white, they would get discoloured and stained with the beeswax. This is not the standard of products that we would like to sell. So, we experimented with different colours to see our best outcomes.

What capabilities we developed?

We learnt how important teamwork is when owning a group business. The times where this has been important is when we are coming close to the market date it is so important that everybody is doing their fair share so that we are ready. We also learnt how important problem solving is. This is because of course when starting up a new business not everything is going to go to plan and things will go wrong. It is important to overcome these things and move on.

In This Health unit we talked about online safety. I learnt a lot about the many dangers that social media opposes but I have also learnt how to deal with and prevent them. The main online platforms I use are, Youtube, Messages and Whatsapp, I still do but I am aware of how to use them efficiently. The key things I learnt this health unit are about respect, responsibility and empathy.

Respect – It is about not criticizing other people for what they believe. It’s very important to have this quality online because not everyone is going to agree with everything you say but that is fine. Everyone doesn’t need to see things the way you do.

Empathy – It is about walking a mile in someone else’s shoes, seeing things in the perspective of others. We should realize that not all people have the same point of view as others. Again, others shouldn’t be attacked by hateful comments because of their thought of something. Online, it is a great quality to have because it allows us to get an idea of what others may be going through. It can also help us to sympathize with them.

Responsibility- It is about being mature. Responsibility shows that you know how to manage and control yourself well. This quality is important to have because you know what to post and what not to post. It helps when you are commenting on something and standing up for either yourself or someone else. When you are standing up for yourself or someone else it is important to shut them down in a kind manner and not offend anyone.

The topics in this unit have affected my online behavior by making me more aware of the things that go on in social media, for example, the devastating story about Dolly. It definitely helped me understand how to use online platforms safer and more efficiently. It made me understand that comments can be easily misunderstood because you don’t know the tone of them. I learnt that there is always someone to talk to when you need.

I will certainly change my online behavior in the future and this how I will do it – I will make sure to use ERIC when I am using online platforms and make sure that everything I do will not cause any harm to me or others. I will stand up for myself or other people if people are commenting hateful things about us. I will know when it is appropriate to comment and what and what not to post. Overall, it was a really informative unit and it has helped me a lot.

In HASS we recently learnt what a water footprint was. I was really shocked because I saw that we use so much water in our everyday lives. Just imagine, for one hamburger, the water footprint is 660 gallons! The way to improve your water footprint is to eat more fruits and vegetables.

This year in InnovatED we designed a gift for our grandparents, describing the differences between our education. For my family friend i created a replica of a textbook, talking about the different resources, learning areas, and much more. We did this over a term, planning, creating and expanding our ideas.

In Food Tech this week we had the opportunity to make oatmeal slices. We made these with only a few ingredients, golden syrup, flour, sugar, oats, egg and butter. We then put these into the oven to bake for 20 minutes. When they came out we cut them into slices and put them into our containers. They turned out to be super delicious!

In HASS we did a water carrying experiment. We did this because we wanted experience the struggle of having a low water supply. We had to carry a 15 L water bottle for 200 m. It was really tiring. The other experiment we carried out was transferring water from a bucket to another with only our hands. We had to save as much water as we could and not waste any. It took a long time to fill the bucket even until halfway.

This year, I have joined a new class called Innovat[ED]. It is a class that lets our creativity flow and we learn new skills . We have small competitions and build interesting things. This term, we were sorted into different groups and we are trying to help solve some of the Global Goals. In our group, I am currently building a hydroelectric generator with Phoebe Jarvis and Hazel Miller. The generator will be able to power a tiny light bulb at the end of it. It will be made out of recycled materials as well.