Sorry Saga - “It’s actually quite funny people thinking they know more than they actually do”

I thought he might be more of a 3 December The Emerson, Sth Yarra or 6 December Publican, Mornington type

It’s nice to be noticed😊

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I will give it to them, the game itself now has definitely been clouded since 2013.

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Isn’t that where Jobe played as a junior?

Possibly BSD trying to sell some cuke sandwiches and wondering why no-one knows what the ■■■■ he’s talking about.

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Overrated thread. Cuke’n’roll

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Cuke Adds Life

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SMJ, The advertisement clearly talks about the saga, raw and uncensored. “Let’s hear what actually really happened from these two legends who had to live through it” etc. I don’t imagine there will be too many questions about the new addition to the Watson clan. I, for one, am intrigued by what has motivated these guys to talk in a public forum, where it could get very messy or be a total disappointment. But then again us Bomber fans have experienced a fair bit of both in the past 5 years.

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If you are going to do the big “reveal”, you do it once. Not five times.

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Exhibit A: Billy Brownless

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The Australian Crime Commission illegally served as a de facto star chamber for AFP investigators and forced people to answer questions when they refused to do so with police, the High Court has ruled.

Now known as the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, the agency refused to say how commonplace the practice was or whether the judgment casts doubt on the integrity of any past prosecutions.

The ACC/ACIC has strong powers that allow it to summon people to “examinations”, where they are legally compelled to answer questions. Those powers do not extend to the Australian Federal Police, which refused to comment on the judgment.

In a unanimous decision, the High Court found the ACC had acted unlawfully by having persons of interest in a criminal investigation brought in for examinations when that agency was not investigating the matter.

The court found that it had acted as a “facility” for the AFP to cross-examine a group of people for the police investigators’ own purposes.

A majority of the court also held that the prosecutions against the affected men — who cannot be identified for legal reasons — be stayed as a result of the illegal examinations.

An ACIC spokesman said the agency has been examining the decision since it was handed down on Thursday.

The events leading up to the High Court ruling began in 2008, when the then ACC was made aware of allegations of criminal behaviour by a company. It referred the matter to the AFP, which opened an investigation.

A group of four men then declined to be interviewed by AFP officers. But in 2010 the ACC examined each of them, who were unaware that AFP investigators were watching them from another room.

All information from the examinations were then passed on to the AFP and the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, and led to charges against the four men.

Before the men went to trial, the Supreme Court of Victoria ordered the prosecution of the men be permanently stayed.

That decision was overturned in the state’s Court of Appeal last year. The men then took the matter to the High Court.

They no longer face any criminal trial in relation to the matters they were charged with, after a majority of the full bench of the High Court ruled that doing so “would bring the administration of justice into disrepute”.

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The only difference of fact in regard to the behaviour of the AFL and ASADA is that the players were aware that ASADA was in the room and that they responded to ASADA questions. Never mind that they were bound by their AFL contracts to do so.
And never mind that ASADA did not then have the power to compel the players to be interviewed.
Middleton’s judgment is a joke ,in acknowledging that ASADA’s statutory powers could be conferred and extended by a private sector company, without Parliamentary legislative approval.

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Exactly the issue.

Under Middleton’s judgement, any public authority can circumvent it’s legislative powers via a private 3rd party’s commercial contract framework.

In our case, it made the AFL player contracts hold more legislative weight - despite not actually being legislated - than the actual ASADA Act passed by Federal Parliament. A Federal Parliament that considered, and rejected, ASADA’s request to remove the athlete’s right to remain silent which is common to all common law and covers alleged murderers and rapists.

In effect, our players - any player - under law had less rights than murderers and rapists.

How Middleton’s verdict stands - and the appeal that witheld his verdict stands - is mystery in itself and a complete disgrace.

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Exactly. And if the parliament was fair dinkum, it would delete the clause about the right to not self incriminate from the Act or change it so it actually protected the rights of athletes. To leave it as it is means that athletes in the future will be led to belief they have the right to remain silent when in fact they don’t. It is a stain on our our system of government that an Act of parliament purports to protect citizens when in fact it does no such thing.

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The High Court was rightly concerned that collusion between two statutory bodies could bring administrative justice into disrepute.
It should be even more concerned when collusion between a statutory body and a private sector company, sanctioned by the Federal Court, serves to usurp the functions of the legislature.

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Without knowing the machinations of the legal system, would this decision from the High Court be able now to be used as precedent if one of the players (say a well known indigenous player who made friends with the Carr brothers) was to appeal the ASADA investigation by revisiting the argument made by Hird and upheld by the Federal Court. Which decision would hold primacy?

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A summary of the High Court findings, together with submissions , is up on the High Court site.
The reasoned judgment will follow.

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The High Court found there was an abuse of process, broadly on the grounds that the ACC was acting as a facilitator for the AFP. A few references to the need to protect rights against self incrimination.
In the Essendon case, the AFL could be categorised as the facilitator of the abuse of process. Absent the exercise of AFL coercive powers, it could be that ASADA would not have gotten to the ADRV stage.

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Fact is, they only look after their own. The players never had a chance.

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I think Middleton was told what verdict to give …if politicians & other public servants can be influenced then so can judges how he came up with that judgement after reading (& I suppose he did) the ASADA legislation is beyond my comprehension.

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