New Zealand - Police are appealing a decision to throw out charges against 21 motorcycle club members after a fake prosecution of an undercover officer was launched.
Police will head to the Court of Appeal over a judge's decision throwing out charges against 21 people after police launched a fake prosecution of an undercover officer.
Police are appealing Justice Simon France's decision which threw out charges against the members of the Red Devils Motorcycle Club because of the fake prosecution, launched so police could give the officer more credibility in the club.
Crown Law spokeswoman Jan Fulstow said the Crown and defence lawyers met before Justice France at the High Court in Nelson on Monday to thrash out exactly what legal question should be put before the Court of Appeal.
Justice France subsequently referred the matter to the Court of Appeal with the question, "was I wrong to stay all prosecutions of 21 accused in relation to charges fairly said to flow from the Operation Explorer investigation"? Ms Fulstow said.
In his original decision, Justice France threw out the charges after police used a fake warrant to search the undercover officer's lock-up and then laid false charges against him in an attempt to give him more credibility.
Police said they would review undercover operations after the decision.
No date has been set for an appeal.
Disclaimer: The opinions in this article are solely those of the writer, and may not reflect the beliefs of anyone at the Biker News Network/Outlaw Biker World.
This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of political, human rights, economic, democracy, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
If you believe that your copyrighted work has been copied in a way that constitutes
copyright infringement and is accessible on this site or through this service,
you may notify our copyright agent, as set forth in the Digital Millennium
Copyright Act of 1998 (DMCA). For your complaint to be valid under the DMCA, it must meet certain criteria, and you must
Click Here to contact acting agent.