Australia’s legal system is based on the principles of justice which are designed to ensure that laws are applied fairly to all individuals and cases. When conflicts arise in our society, the principles of justice are there to provide reasonable and fair standards to determine what individuals deserve. The main principles of justice are the right to appeal, innocent until proven guilty, equal treatment before the law and the standard of proof. In some cases, these principles have been disregarded, and people have not received a fair treatment within the Australian justice system.
In the case of John Button, not all principles of justice were obeyed. At only 19 years old, John was wrongly convicted of manslaughter and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. He was beaten and forced to sign confession documents during his interrogation by police. Several injustices occurred throughout the trial, including the denial of equal treatment before the law, the lack of standard of proof and the disregarding of innocence until proven guilty. We will look further into these concepts below.
Before the death of his 17 year old girlfriend Rosemary Anderson, her and John Button had been in an argument. She had decided to walk home, despite John offering her a ride in the car. Shortly after, Rosemary was fatally wounded during a hit and run incident and was found by John on the side of the road. John immediately informed the authorities, and when they arrived, Rosemary was taken to hospital where she passed away. The police took John into questioning, where he was beaten and forced to admit to killing her. John was taken to the Supreme Court and was found guilty of manslaughter; he was sentenced to 10 years in jail for a crime he didn’t commit. Later in 1969, serial killer Eric Edgar Cooke confessed to the murder of Rosemary Anderson, killing her in a hit and run incident with a stolen car. After hearing Cooke’s case, the authorities continued to believe John Button had committed the murder. Mr Button’s denials of guilt, and efforts to clear his name were unsuccessful until 1992, when Estelle Blackburn, a journalist turned writer, met him and became fascinated in his story. Her book about Button and Darryl Breamish’s wrongful convictions for Cooke’s murders was released in 1998, successfully freeing John from his wrongful conviction.
One of the principles of justice that was abused during John Button’s trial was the principle of innocent until proven guilty. Innocent until guilty means, every suspect in a criminal trial is considered innocent unless proven guilty. As a result, if a person is to be punished, the prosecutor must provide evidence beyond possible doubt that the individual committed the offence. This principle was not obeyed in Buttons case. After he had just found out his girlfriend Rosemary had passed in hospital, emotions clouding his thoughts, John was taken straight into questioning. He was beaten and forced to sign the confession documents to agree to the murder of his beloved girlfriend Rosemary Anderson. The authorities suggested that John was responsible without any evidence, not following the principles of justice.
Another principle of justice that abused was the standard of proof. This means that a certain quantity of evidence is required to prove a statement is true in a trial. The government has the burden of proof in the criminal justice system. This means that the prosecutor, not the defendant, is responsible for proving its case and the components of the crime accused. There was no evidence that John was responsible for the murder, yet the authorities made him sign a document admitting to it. Even when Eric Edgar Cooke confessed to the murder with documents in 1969, it was turned down, and the case wasn’t reopened. This was not following the principle of standard of proof.
The third principle of justice, which was disregarded was the principle of equal treatment before the law. This principle requires all citizens to be treated equally by the law, and no one should be discriminated against because of race, gender or social status. In this case John was the only person that was investigated, there should have been other suspects. The authorities did not look for further suspects and didn’t spend time to look for further evidence or investigate for serial killers around that area. The authorities did not treat John equally, as he was only 19 and was easily coerced into admitting. This was very unfair as he was treated differently to what an Australian citizen deserved.
The fourth principle is right to appeal. This means the defendant has the right to appeal for a new statement from the judge if he was found guilty. This principle was used correctly despite how unfair this case was. While in jail, John appealed to his sentence 6 times in total. After hearing evidence from experts in vehicle accidents indicating Cooke was very certainly to blame, the Court of Criminal Appeal overturned Button’s conviction on February 25, 2002. This was one of the only principles that was followed in this case.
To this day, 76-year-old John has been living with his new wife, Helen, in a small town 255 km west of Sydney. Out of all the injustices John has been through, and spending over 40 years of his life fighting for justice, he has managed to settle down. John finally won his freedom in 2002 thanks to the writer Estelle Blackburn who put clarity into his case. John was given a mere $460,000 for all the injustices he had been put through. His case has shed light on the ignorance of the principles of justice in the Australian legal system.