JAIL, NOT BAIL

This is going to be difficult and I want to stress that everybody deserves a fair trial and is innocent until proven guilty. I want to stress that for starters.
But. I believe I speak for thousands of people when I ask the question today: How can a young man, driving on L plates, allegedly doing 150 kilometers per hour, with a blood alcohol reading of .165 – more than three times the legal limit – be walking around our streets a free man? While the crushed and lifeless body of a student allegedly killed by his car lies in the morgue.

How can this be?  The motorist, 19-year-old Puneet Puneet, an overseas student, was released on bail by a Magistrate yesterday. Sure, there are bail restrictions.  He must report to Police five times a week and he must surrender his passport because he could be perceived as a flight risk.

But why should a person on such a serious charge of culpable –accused of such reckless, criminal, behaviour – be walking free for the next three or four months until his trial comes up?

Puneet is free. He’ll have a summer of freedom including the festive season. The dead man, 19-year-old nursing student Dean Hofstee, will never know such freedom ever again. He was in Melbourne, happily attending the university games as part of a water polo team.  He was one step from the safety of his hotel on City Road when a lethal weapon called a car ended his dreams and his life.  His family and friends will spend the so-called festive seasons shrouded in grief.

To me this case leads to a bigger debate. These days cars kill more people than guns do. If you are charged with murder you can only be released on bail by the Supreme Court. A magistrate doesn’t have that power. It seems to me that neither should he or she.

When there is a car accident in which a person dies, and where there are Police allegations of excessive alcohol and excessive speed, the accused should not, in my opinion, be granted bail.

He should be remanded in custody pending a speedy trial. As it stands right now the only person in a form of prison is 20-year-old Clancy Coker. He was standing next to his friend outside the Mantra Hotel when the car cut them down. Coker is in hospital, lucky to be alive, with head injuries and suspected fractures to his pelvis and his legs. He can’t walk around. The car driver can. And that is just wrong.

Thursday, October 2, 2008

© Copyright Derryn Hinch 2008