Sunday, August 05, 2007

Back again

In Perth, the police lamely lamented the 'ice epidemic' with another talk-fest (but no greater transparency), but two shocking assaults in the Perth area over the last week have really highlighted the mental disturbance drug users face, and the stark consequences for the general public.

An assault on two men in Mandurah resulted in the death of one, and a senior robbed in her own home suffered horrible injuries at the hands of a merciless assailant - all for $15. Premier Carpenter has offered $30,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of the culprit, so get out your junior detective kits everyone - could (almost) earn you enough for a deposit on a house in WA where the cost of housing is spiralling completely out of sync with the reasons for being here.

Meantime, the federal human services minister, WA Senator Chris Ellison, got his vacation allowances outed in the media. Although Ellison does not appear to have done anything wrong, the examination of the widely accepted (but never publicly revealed) practice has really shown up the hypocrisy in the federal government, who can justify luxury holidays for the extended family of its ministers with one hand, but cuts a meagre austudy allowance to pensioners, the disabled and single mothers, with the other. Bring on the election.

And Perth prisoner, Otto Darcy Searle, having completed 5 years of his 11 year sentence for 104 child sex offences he committed as a junior soccer coach between 1978 & 1982, has been released back into the Perth community. The DPP and the Supreme Court's Justice Peter Blaxell, decided one year of supervision by Perth police would be adequate monitoring for the paedophile, who in 2005 was returned to a WA gaol in response to the public outcry after he was released to live with his family in Banora Point, NSW.

The West's editor is in hot water again, after the DPP decided to pursue him for contempt.

The troubled WA education dept has suffered another blow, as the former principal of Balga high school faces 15 corruption charges relating to misappropriation of $400,000 of school funds.

A man employed as an assistant coach at a private school in Padbury, has been charged with several counts of recording a child 13-16 y/o, after his mp3 player was turned over to the police by a student, who found it contained pornographic material.

The trial of Dante Arthurs, accused of sexually abusing and murdering an 8 y/o girl at the Canning Vale Shopping Centre, will be heard by a judge alone.
This decision follows the recent controversial decision by the appeal court in relation to the Philip Walsham case, when a decision by a jury was overturned after a judge said a judgement reached by a jury may not be as reliable as that of a judge.

A CCC inquiry into the police investigation of the Pamela Lawrence murder has commenced. Andrew Mallard's conviction for the murder was overturned last year, and the handling of the police investigation will be examined. The inquiry revealed that Simon Rochford(who mysteriously died in gaol before police could charge him with the already 'solved' Lawrence murder), was heard sharpening a knife(is that a readily identifiable sound in gaol???)by a corrections officer, who didn't bother checking on the source of the noise. The inquiry can be followed on Colleen Egan's blog.