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 Loyd rayney, 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.
The Loyd Rayney case was a murder case that was formed from the murder of corin rayney. The murder happened one night in august 2007 after one of Corins boot scooting classes and after it she disappeared. She didn’t come home that night so Loyd thought she went to work early but her workplace said she hadn’t shown up. Loyd knew something was wrong. Her body was found a week later buried on a trail in kings park after a brake fluid from her car led police there. The principles of justice were mostly upheld but some weren’t . the principles of justice that are obvious in this case are timeliness, reliable evidence, right to a fair trial and presumption of innocence.
In this case timeliness was not upheld at all, after corins body was found Loyd was labelled as the only subject by the police, there was 3 years until the trial started which is far too long because in those years loyd was not being able to work because people were labelling him as a murderer and his whole life was being destroyed because of the polices words and investigation. Once the trial had started it took 2 years before loyd was found not guilty for the murder of his wife. This means there was 5 years were loyd couldn’t work or live a normal life. This caused Loyd to lose a lot of money and years of his life.
Reliable evidence was not upheld in this case because of liquid amber seed pods the size of golf balls being planted on Corins body and in her hair. The coroner who examined her body said that in the first inspection he missed the seed pods but in the second he found 2 seed pods, also a seed pod was found in her body bag. The seed pods were examined, and they found no sand particles from king’s park in the seed pods. This is not reliable because if she was buried in kings park and had seed pods in her hair then there should be sand in the seed pods.
The right to a fair trial was upheld because it let Loyd choose to have a judge decide instead of a jury, if there was a jury, he would have been found guilty because he had already been trialled by the media which had him portrayed as guilty because of what the police was telling the media, this means if there was a jury trial he would have been found guilty because of what the media was saying.
The principle of justice presumption of innocence was upheld in this case because it was a judge trial and there was no outside influence being put on the judge because he was from a different state. If it was a jury trial, there would’ve been no presumption of innocence because of what the police had been saying on the media. It could’ve been followed better if the police had not said that he was the only subject because that meant that everyone thought he was guilty. There were other people the police could’ve labelled as a suspect, but they didn’t follow the principles of justice.
In this case the principle of justice had been mostly upheld but had been terribly comprised. The principles of justice timeliness, presumption of innocence , reliable evidence and right to a fair trial are good examples of some upheld principles and some compromised principles. Loyd Rayney was proven not guilty and took the state to court and won 2.8 million dollars in damages.