My husband has experianced this firsthand, with the false accusation of assault towards his child. Upon being called to go to the police station (with no reason why) he was arrested and then, due to delays on behalf of the police for over 2 hours, was unable to apply for bail and spent the night in lock up, as the case was a family violence issue. With no evidence other than statements, charges were dropped after 6 months, by which time we had spent over $10,000 to continue contact with the children. Even after the DPP formally dropped charges due to lack of evidence (on the 4th court hearing to set trial details), the magistrate in the Family Court declared that he had to take the (false) accusations into account when deciding on contact arrangements, even after these charges were dropped, therefore presuming my husband guilty. After such an experiance, we would have been better off for the case to go to trial and fight for his inocence (which we believed we could prove) as now we have been forever tagged as maybe offenders.

Thank you for your article because unfortunately i am a victim of the exact situation that you discuss in your article. My bofriend and three co accused has been remanded in custody for over a year awaiting trial for a crime that they did not commit. As the days draw nearer to the trial the prosecution has made attempts at offering some of the accused indemnity if they blame each other, obviously this is impossible because they are all innocent. However it leaves me to question the system. By law charges should not be laid unless they are sure they will achieve a conviction. Now four people have been charged for the same crime, the background of the case is entirely circumstancial (at best)yet the prosecution are prepared to let some go, how much of a case will they have against these young men if they are making these offers with only days left till the trial. Also how pathetic must these men be to sit in prison for over a year spend over $200,000 in legal costs if they knew someone elso was reponsible. They are all innocent and when the truth comes out we will not be compensated for the financial and emotinal effect this has had on our lives. Not only that, but the real perpetrators of the crime are not held accountable, so yet another injustice has occured. I would love the public to know just how much of their tax paying money has been expended into this case which is based soley on one mans opinion. Awareness needs to be raised aboout these issues because too often people are not interested because they think it does not involve them or will never happen to them. Well i believed that too, until now, innocent people are charged and their rights are taken away, they are incapacitated in a remand centre which is just another name for prison, however refered to as innocent until proven guilty.If readers still feel that this does not affect them, well i have one question for you do you pay your taxes?