Hi, I want plagiarism free assignment by 16 August. please see attached assignment and requirement and case note style example.
Introduction to the Australian Legal System and Legal Methods LAW1019 Semester 2, 2019 Assessment Task – Research and Evaluation Skills Case Note This assessment task is designed to evaluate your ability to find, read and critically analyse a court decision. You are required to prepare a Case Note. 1. Locate, research and analyse a court decision. Your case summary must include the following information: • The correct case citation; • The judge(s) and the date of the judgment; • The names of the parties and their role in the litigation (i.e. are they the appellant, the respondent?); • A brief summary of the material facts; • The key legal issues for determination; • A summary of the analysis of the law and the principles of law applied in the judgment; • The final outcome and the orders made by the court. 2. Write a critical analysis of the decision. You should consider the following questions: • From a public policy perspective, do you think the court arrived at the right outcome? Why/why not? The different groups will have to research the following decisions: Group 1/2 (Tim): Trkulja v Yahoo! Inc LLC & Anor [2012] VSC 88 Group 3/4 (Chelsea): Thorne v Kennedy [2017] HCA 49 (you only need to summarise the judgment of the plurality) Group 5/6 (Lisa): Sawyer-Thompson v The Queen [2018] VSCA 161 Group 7/8 (Chris): R v Ferguson; ex parte A-G (Qld) [2008] QCA 227 Total Word Limit: 1500 words (not counting footnotes) Due Date: 23:59 pm on 17 August 2019 Marks: This assessment task is worth 15% of the total marks for this course. Please see the rubric in the assessment guide for a breakdown of the marks applicable to each component of the assessment task. Your paper should be written using the Australian Guide to Legal Citation style, including for the referencing of all sources. You will lose marks if you do not follow the correct style. Papers must be submitted electronically through Turnitin. Please also refer to the Course Guide for this course which includes information about available grades; extensions of time; special consideration for assessment tasks; and the rules relating to plagiarism and academic misconduct. Case note style example for crucial parts of your case note! Please note that there are more points you need to address – carefully read the instructions handed out and the rubric! The case students had to write about here was: Smith v The Queen (2015) 255 CLR 161 Brief summary of the material facts The appellant was tried and convicted of rape in the District Court of Queensland.1 During the trial before a judge and a jury, the jury was unable to reach a verdict after lengthy deliberations.2 The jury then wrote a note to the trial judge informing him of its interim voting patterns.3 While the trial judge informed counsel that there was no total agreement, he did not disclose the jury’s voting patterns.4 At this stage the jury had been deliberating for more than eight hours, a time period that allowed the judge to give a majority verdict direction according to s 59A(2) of the Jury Act 1995 (Qld).5 The jury was duly advised and convicted the appellant shortly after by a 11:1 majority.6 An appeal of this conviction to the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of Queensland, on procedural fairness grounds, was dismissed.7 Smith was granted special leave to appeal to the High Court of Australia. Legal issues for determination The High Court had to determine whether the appellant was denied procedural fairness because jury interim voting patterns were not revealed to counsel.8 This included a consideration of whether the non-disclosure of votes and voting patterns to counsel were relevant to an issue before the court.9 The High Court also had to consider whether the disclosure of the voting information to the court could have influenced ‘the trial judge’s exercise of discretion to either either a majority verdict or to discharge the jury’.10 A summary of the analysis of the law and the principles of law applied in the judgment (extract) Gordon J (with the other judges of the HC agreeing) based her decision principally on the authorities referred to below. Her Honour first examined the importance of the confidentiality of jury deliberations, which she considered to be a principle of highest significance in the criminal justice system. 11 Therefore, jury votes or voting patterns should not be revealed, to the court or otherwise, which is a sensible direction for the judge to give to the juries.12 This high level of confidentiality of the jury voting process was necessary to safeguard ‘frank and open discussions’13 in the jury room, ensuring that the view of each juror can develop over time, a process Her Honour has described as ‘fluid, not static’.14 Its nature is determined by a process of jury decision making that needs to consider not only whether guilt has been established beyond reasonable doubt, but evaluate ‘particular questions that are steps along the way’.15 Ultimately 1 Smith v The Queen (2015) 255 CLR 161, 166. 2 Ibid 167-8. 3 Ibid 168. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid 168-9. 6 Ibid 169. 7 Ibid 170-1. 8 Ibid 166. 9 Ibid 175. 10 Ibid 176. 11 Ibid 171. 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid. 15 Ibid 171-2. it is only the final verdict which is relevant, and not the process of reaching that verdict. Jury confidentiality is crucial to protecting the finality of this verdict.16 Her Honour considered whether the non-disclosure of the voting patterns could give rise to the denial of procedural fairness for the appellant. Drawing on the decision of Mason CJ and McHugh J in Dietrich v The Queen,17 Her Honour stated that the concept of a fair trial had not strict boundaries, however, one of the requirements of a fair trial was procedural fairness.18 She refers to the statements of the Victorian Court of Appeal, R v Wise,19 which found that procedural fairness requires that counsel gets the opportunity to ‘see and comment upon any material relevant to the issue before the court which is available to the judge and known not to be available to counsel’.20 This disclosure rule, Gordon J finds, also requires the court to provide the accused and the prosecution with the opportunity to make ‘submissions which bear upon the future conduct of the trial’.21 She further refines these requirements, with reference to the Victorian Court of Appeal in Ucar v Nylex Industrial Products Ltd,22 which provided that: a party should be given the opportunity to respond to matters prejudicial to its interests that are known only to the court and which might be taken into account in the determination of issues that may affect the party’s property, rights or legitimate expectations.23 This, her Honour finds, also implicitly means that where the information ‘is not available to an issue before the court, nor regarded irrelevant … its non-disclosure cannot be a denial of procedural fairness’. 24 Gordon J than considers the applicable provisions of the Jury Act 1995 (Qld), especially s 70(2), which restricts the publication of jury information to the public, and s 70(6), which permits its disclosure to the court ‘to the extent necessary for the proper performance of the jury’s function.’25 She finds that the disclosure of the interim votes of the jury to the judge was not necessary for the proper performance of the jury’s role to determine the guilt of the accused.26 Neither, she found, was disclosure to the judge necessary to exercise his discretion whether to discharge the jury or to advise them to consider a majority verdict.27 However, the right of the accused to a fair trial was not displaced by these provisions, because the information disclosed to the judge was not ‘relevant to an issue before the court’, ‘because of the protean and changeable character of the jury’s deliberation’. 28 Because changing jury votes are part of the jury process, they cannot be relevant.29 Her Honour approves the decision of the Queensland Court of Appeal in this case,30 which provided that it is questionable to what degree voting patterns would provide a basis for a submission by counsel, especially since this could lead to ‘second-guessing of the jury’s deliberations’.31 Instead the only information relevant to counsel was the question of whether a majority vote may resolve the issue, and whether more time was needed – these were discussed in open court.32 16 Ibid 172. 17 Dietrich v The Queen (1992) 177 CLR 292, 299-300. 18 Smith v The Queen (2015) 255 CLR 161, 172-3. 19 R v Wise (2000) 2 VR 287. 20 Ibid 294. 21 Smith v The Queen (2015) 255 CLR 161, 173. 22 Ucar v Nylex Industrial Products Pty Ltd (2007) 17 VR 492. 23 Ibid 294. 24 Smith v The Queen (2015) 255 CLR 161, 173. 25 Jury Act 1995 (Qld) s 70(6). 26 Smith v The Queen (2015) 255 CLR 161, 174. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid 175. 29 Ibid. 30 R v Smith [2015] 2 Qd R 452, 482 (per Phillipides J). 31 Smith v The Queen (2015) 255 CLR 161, 175. 32 Ibid.