Australia’s legal system is based on a range of courts & tribunals, legal procedures and more, all involving many authoritative figures such as judges, magistrates, legal representatives, and the police force. There are many key principles of our legal system to protect the right of Australian citizens. Some of these key principles include:

All individuals are equal before the law (meaning that every Australian citizen is required to follow the law regardless of authoritative position), Individuals have the right to a fair hearing- unbiased trials, and the judiciary is independent and impartial, meaning they must be unbiased and separate from parliament and high quality and appropriate evidence must be used. However, if these rights are breached, it will allow individuals to have a reasonable appeal as part of their rights. All people must be treated equally before the law regardless of race, ethnic background, sex, income level and mental capacity, meaning that they must be treated equally by police, court personnel and other legal authority, also equal opportunity to access the court system to resolve personal or business disputes. Equality within the legal system can be achieved in many ways, however, the main solution is a range of laws that can protect an individual’s choices when being questioned by police-

• Right to remain silent
• Right to be warned (“anything you do or say can and will be used against you in court”)
• Right to a present adult/guardian (if under the age of 18)
• Presumption of innocence (meaning innocent until proven guilty- allowing bail, etc)
• Right to translator/ interpreter- if language barriers are present.

All in all, these key principles aim to allow for a smooth-running legal system that can be beneficial for all Australian citizens when dealing with the legal system. However, that may not be the case in this groundbreaking investigation of the murder of Corryn Rayney after she disappeared after her weekly dance class in the Bentley Community Center. Corryn Rayney’s body was found in the centre of Perth’s heart, Kings Park, and a large investigation began. This largely affected the Rayney family as they battle through the press, media, harassment and more, all in the hope to bring justice to the Rayney name.

The presumption of innocence associated with the case was greatly compromised and had a large effect on the life of the husband of the murder victim, Lloyd Rayney & his family, after Detective Senior Sergeant Jack Lee September 2007 released a statement to the public stating Mr Rayney was the prime and only suspect in the case only a month after the body of Mrs Rayney was found in the centre of Kings Park, clearly violating the ethics associated with the Presumption of Innocence. Mr Rayney was labelled as the prime and only suspect of the investigation, which then instigated many issues for the Rayney family. Lloyd Rayney lost many significant parts of his life, such as his career and the trust of many people. Lloyd Rayney worked as a barrister for the state of WA before his career began derailing, he lost his motivation for work, and he often heard crude comments such as being “unfit for the job”. Rayney released statements in response to his career being destroyed. “I am not aware of police ever naming a person as the only suspect in an investigation,” he said, and even “It took more than 20 years to build my career and reputation, and less than 20 minutes to destroy it”. He also said he felt he no longer had a “private personal life”, however that’s not the only way his life was ruined. He was also unable to go to public spaces without being harassed by the general public. Mr Rayney explained the time he was in a taxi and the driver commented on a radio news report that covered the murder of Corryn Rayney, saying “Ahh, the husband did it”, not aware that “the husband” was in fact the passenger. Mr Rayney also received various death threats from strangers in public, a man made a “gun gesture” and said to Mr Rayney “you’re dead”, and when Mr Rayney entered a Subway sandwich shop, another stranger recognized him and made a “cut-throat” gesture. While watching a movie, a stranger approached Mr Rayney and asked, “Did you kill your wife?” and walked off laughing. Mr Rayney also received numerous anonymous calls and emails sending him various threats, his house was also egged by numerous teenagers, and he had been called “murderer” by countless strangers. Mr Rayney and his family no longer felt safe in their own home. Almost a year after the death of Corryn Rayney, the Rayney family was celebrating the birthday of one of the daughters, when suddenly, a neighbour made a crude joke and shouted, “You’re celebrating her death!”. After all the danger and distress brought upon the Rayney family, Mr Rayney sued the Western Australian Government for defamation and won, over a decade after the death of his wife. Therefore, the clear violation of the Presumption of Innocence made by police took a large toll on the Rayney household after the death of Corryn Rayney.

Video of Sergeant Jack Lee releasing statement and then facing trial for defamation case against Lloyd Rayney-https://thewest.com.au/news/crime/cop-jack-lee-who-named-lloyd-rayney-prime-suspect-faces-trial-ng-b88437197z

High-quality evidence is an essential factor in ensuring that the accused person is guilty beyond reasonable doubt, however, that was not the case for Mr Rayney. The prosecution presented a large abundance of evidence to the court, however, none of which was nearly enough to prove Mr Rayney as the true murderer of his wife. There were no witnesses to the crime, hence why police had to find only forensic evidence. During the trial, the evidence presented by the prosecution did not support the case in which the police claimed that Mr Rayney hid the body of his wife and then dragged it along the driveway of the Rayney house in Como before burying it in Kings Park. For example, the mysterious appearance of seed pods. The pathologist ran fingers through the body’s hair during the preliminary exam and nothing was found. However, the next day during the autopsy, 3 seed pods mysteriously showed up. But after looking at the captured video of the preliminary examination, it is near impossible that 3 seed pods the size of golf balls were missed during the examination. Later, another seed pod was found in the body bag, although there were fragments of the Rayney house on it, not a single grain of sand (from the site of the burial) was found on the seed pod. Not a single photo of the seed pod was captured despite the photographer being present when the body bag was originally searched. This leads to the belief of police planting evidence with their main motive being the millions of dollars and many years spent on the investigation of Lloyd Rayney. Police also testified that the dance boots (from the dance class the night before) found on the body had drag marks on the heels of the shoes from the body being dragged along the brickwork of the Rayney home’s driveway. But due to the winter, moss had grown between the bricks and not a single drag mark was on the moss whatsoever. Forensic scientists even did tests on the moss, which lead to the conclusion that the testimony was false. Expert forensic opinion was also given about the boots and stated that the scuff marks on the shoes were caused by regular “wear and tear”. The prosecution did not give up on the testimony, they also pitched that small brick fragments found on the clasp of the bra were also from the dragging of the body. However, not a single drag mark, let alone scratch, was found on the back of the corpse. Police also claimed that the position in which the body was buried was intentional to speed up the decomposition process, buried head down with arms crossed to the body and legs facing up. Nevertheless, more investigation from the defence of Lloyd showed that not a single case ever recorded, and no forensic evidence allowed the body in that position to speed up decomposition. Regardless, Lloyd Rayney had a significant back problem and a small figure, making it almost impossible for him to do the things the police claimed he had done. The night of the disappearance, Mr Rayney’s oldest daughter attended a concert and was dropped off around 10:30 by a trusted family friend, the family friend testified that Mr Rayney was acting completely normal that night, even inviting her inside for a cup of coffee, which would be unusual if Mr Rayney had murdered his wife a few hours before. Even the day after the disappearance of Corryn Rayney, Rayney returned to work thinking that his wife had gone to work early. Mr Rayney’s coworkers described him as a very consistent person with a consistent attitude to his work, and they had stated that the morning Mr Rayney returned to work, he looked and acted completely normal as if he were any other day. In short, the prosecution presented numerous pieces of evidence to the court, none of which was high quality to prove Mr Rayney guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Although most of the principles of justice were compromised in this case, the Right to Remain Silent was supported which then played a significant role in proving Lloyd Rayney was not responsible for the death of his wife. On September 21st, 2007, police came to the Rayney household and knocked on the door of their home in Como. Lloyd Rayney refuses to open the door to the police as he feared he was going to be harassed. Even though it was not in Rayney’s legal right to refuse to open the door to the police, it was in his legal right to remain silent during the interrogation. Rayney was very familiar with his rights, and he used them in his power to minimize his chance of being incriminated while being questioned intensively. Detective Sergeant of the WA police stated, “He has a legal right to not cooperate during to not answer questions during an interview and he took that legal right so you could say it’s non-co-operation, but he’s abided himself of his legal privilege”. WA Police also requested to interrogate Mr Rayney’s two daughters, however, Rayney refused their request. Rayney remaining silent played a key part in proving that Rayney was not guilty as he denied any involvement with the murder of his wife, setting a prime basis for his testimony in his future trial.

The Principles of Justice are essential in ensuring the protection of Australian citizens when dealing with legal situations. However, that was not the case with the investigation of the murder of Corryn Rayney, many Principles of Justice, including the Presumption of Innocence and High-quality Evidence, were compromised greatly, which took a large toll on the Rayney household. However, the Australian legal system continues to improve and strives to uphold justice always.