When the world is going mad and making some rather bizarre and scary decisions Queensland, Australia have made a startling new court ruling that comes maybe a hundred years too late, but from here on in it will have a positive effect on the justice and support for women appearing in court due to abuse from a male especially rape, writes Ruta Mave.

The Attorney General stated “No one wants to hear that a rapist is an all-around great person, a trustworthy friend, or that they are respected in the community - especially not their victim, who is bravely sitting in court”

During trial, the jury are not allowed to know any of the man’s past convictions or if he is on bail for a similar offence for which he is being trialed. It was deemed unfair that his actions in the past should influence the decisions on his recent actions.

What has been allowed and happens regularly in our courts, is that good character references of his past can be heard as balance towards his present and less noble actions of abuse. Queensland courts are restricting the use of good character references being used as a measure of how good the man was, so he shouldn’t be punished harshly for his present abusive actions.

When people give their character reference, this is done in the knowledge their great mate has been through a court case and is now a charged offender looking for a way to soften their sentencing.  These people are willing to put their own public repute on the line, fully aware of a change in character of the abuser, they defend his honour without question of how this great guy they know, would do such a thing, even when he pleaded guilty. Where will they stand when the abuser has been caught again and is charged on another offence? What defence can the lawyer use this time, when he said last time ‘he will not do it again’

If the offender is unable to get the same list of impeccable references as they did the first time what does that say about them? Or what does it say about their fair-weather friends?

The confusing issue with good references is logically if this person was such a good upstanding member of the community why is he being charged?

Logically, it should be that if they were pillars of society they should suffer more because they should know better and have better personal control to not go down the road of abusing others. Which is why the ex-deputy prime minister was sentenced to prison because as the judge implied holding such a position of power means a greater responsibility to do the right thing, not give you a get out of jail free card due to your title or connections. 

We have let drunk drivers free of conviction because they are an upstanding citizen of the community.  We have let women off lightly for theft because they are a mum of three children. We let a man off conviction for assault despite him pleading guilty because he had 14 exemplary character references from high ranking officials. 

If they have stolen once, they will steal again, We make it easy for them by not holding them accountable. They commit the act again because we let them off because ‘we like them’.

We say let’s not forget what a great guy he is. Instead we forget he injured people who were unable to work. They too are good people who are liked and have friends to vouch for them. But if their character references are ordinary blue collar compared to the abusers, they are forgotten. 

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Too many times we say but he is a nice guy I like him or this is his first offence. Maybe it is the first time he has been caught or has appeared before a judge. This does not mean he has not done this before or that he will not do it again. Their actions have demonstrated that they do not have a good character to say otherwise is a lie.

Character references are subjective it should be an objective ‘did they do it yes or no’

Good character should not be used to influence sentencing because he might be fine with his mates publicly but not in private.

Ted Bundy was a nice guy he was an American serial killer who abducted, raped and murdered dozens of young women between 1974 and 1978. 20 were confirmed, 30 he confessed to and 36+ suspected. He frequently revisited the bodies of his victims performing sex acts on the corpses until decomposition and destruction by wild animals made further interaction impossible. But in public he was seen to have an outward charm and charismatic personality. People liked him too.