VINCE SIEMER REPORT: ‘POLICE CONCEDED MOST EXPENSIVE PROSECUTION IN HISTORY IS LIKELY TO RESULT ONLY IN FINES’

9 May 2011

www.kiwisfirst.co.nz/

POLICE CONCEDED MOST EXPENSIVE PROSECUTION IN HISTORY IS LIKELY TO RESULT ONLY IN FINES

9 May 2011
In a Wikileaks disclosure posted on 28 April 2011, it is revealed at cable “7” that New Zealand Police advised the U.S. Embassy in Wellington in late 2007 that the 18 accused in the Operation 8 “terror raids” are likely to face fines not exceeding $4,000.

This revelation is the latest in a massive prosecution which has since cost taxpayers over $13 million ahead of trial and is the subject of a United Nations complaint against the New Zealand Police and blanket suppression orders by the New Zealand courts.

In related action, Crown Law has claimed to have spent over $100,000 prosecuting kiwisfirst publisher Vince Siemer for breaching suppression orders relating to these secret court proceedings. Siemer’s trial for publishing High Court Judge Helen Winkelmann’s December 2010 order denying the accused their statutory right of trial by jury is set to commence in the Wellington High Court on 8 June 2011. The Solicitor General David Collins is asking for Mr Siemer’s imprisonment notwithstanding the fact that even Crown Prosecutor Ross Burns has stated suppression cannot be justified in law and the accused in the case being reported on by kiwisfirst are realistically facing fines according to the Police.

Having been bankrupted by the New Zealand Courts, Mr Siemer is on legal aid. The cost of the trial is expected to cost taxpayers another $70,000 to prosecute and half this again to defend. This is assuming no appeal is necessary.