Our client is a 22-year old IP professional living at Lismore Heights with his partner.
As a result of a police surveillance operation, our client was apprehended and charged with two counts of supplying a large commercial quantity of prohibited drugs as well as participating in a criminal group, with police alleging he was part of a criminal syndicate.
He was refused police bail and was brought before Lismore Local Court for a bail application.
The alleged offences were “show cause” in nature, which means the onus is placed on the defence which bears the burden to prove to the court that having our client detained pending the finalisation of his case would be unjust in all of the circumstances.
During the bail hearing, the prosecution made a number of submissions in support of opposing bail including the seriousness of the charges, the strength of the prosecution case, the prospects of our client not attending court, the inevitability of a lengthy, full-time custodial sentence. They based these submissions on both video and audio recordings which, they submitted, established beyond reasonable doubt that our client had committed these serious offences.
Our team carefully scrutinised the allegations, took detailed instructions from our client, made contact with a well-respected drug rehabilitation clinic and submitted in court that there were a number of issues regarding the claimed strength of the prosecution case, including identification of our client and that there was a potentially available defence of duress.
We submitted that our client had a serious substance disorder and that, in the event the allegations were made out, there were very real issues regarding whether our client was forced to engage in alleged conduct.
We handed-up a speedily obtained letter from a rehabilitation program regarding his acceptance as well as documentation from his general practitioner regarding his addiction and, after presenting written proposed bail conditions and making lengthy verbal submissions, persuaded the presiding magistrate – who initially made remarks questioning why an application would be made for bail given the charges and materials – to grant bail conditional upon our client obtaining treatment.
It is important to bear in mind that the materials were obtained within a matter of hours, through our team coming together to ensure our client was put in the strongest possible position, despite the seriousness of the allegations and the material served upon us by the prosecution.