Judging the Judges !

An interesting case in the Sydney court system will certainly whet the appetite of the many people dissatisfied with the cavalier attitude of some judges when it comes to sentencing.  A man walking a street in the Sydney suburb of Alexandria had two leashed dogs when he encountered another man coming in the opposite direction - who also had leashed dogs.

Both pairs of dogs showed aggression to one another and the first man backed up against a parked car and drew his dogs close to avoid a fight.  Without provocation,  the other man launches an attack with his fists and hammered his face with many blows. This broke bones, closed one of his eyes and left him with permanent numbness on one side of his face.

Fortunately, this incident was recorded by a nearby cctv camera and the police arrested the attacker and put him before a judge. The attacker was a 33 year old professional boxer - with a string of previous assault convictions. It is the custom to regard the fists of boxers as "deadly weapons "when they are used outside a boxing ring.  The assaulted man had every reason to expect redress from the judge.

To his astonishment the judge refused to view the camera footage and declared it was "not relevant ". He simply dismissed the charge and allowed the attacker to walk free.  This led to an appeal that was held before a higher court and this time the video got the full attention of the judiciary.  It showed a sickening degree of force against a helpless man totally unable to defend himself - and the court awarded a twelve month prison term against the attacker - who was not in court and is now on the run.

This - and many similar cases - raises the question of what review exists to determine that judges are performing their duties to a level consistent with the law. The constitution requires separation between the judiciary and the parliament and a judge can only be dismissed by a special sitting of both houses of parliament - sitting together - who come to a seventy percent common vote to achieve that aim.

That is extremely rare.   We once had a judge who suffered a disability that seemed to prevent him reaching conclusions.  For years he heard cases, reserved his judgement and failed to ever deliver a verdict.  This reached such a stage of embarrassment that this form of impeachment was under way - when he saw sense and resigned.

Within the law community it seems that a clever little evaluation of merit prevails. The entire court system is an overlaying system of seniority.  Decisions are open to "appeal " and when an appeal is heard it goes before a higher court whose judges are deemed to be wiser that those of the lower court - and this can extend to the ultimate decisions by the High Court of Australia.

Having a verdict over-ruled is seen as a slap on the wrist for an erring judge.  They glow with pride when an appeal is dismissed and that higher court validates their verdict. Unfortunately, a judge that consistently gets it wrong seems to hold tenure without review.   Some judges are well known for overlaying their personal foibles when it comes to the law and there seems no reasonable mechanism in place to ensure consistency.

Perhaps we could learn from the points system used to weed out traffic offenders and get bad drivers off the road.   It would be up to the senior judiciary to settle on a point score under which a judge should be automatically stood down, and every time a judge had an appeal upheld against his or her verdict that would deliver a demerit point against that score.

It would certainly have judges pay strict attention to protocol - and avoid some of the glaring deficiencies that denigrate respect for the law !