Mission & Justice

16/5/08

A US marine has been sentenced to four years in prison, and dishonourably discharged from the US military, for sexually abusing a 14-year-old Japanese girl. Sergeant Tyrone Hadnott was found guilty of sexual abuse at a military court on the island of Okinawa, home to half of the 40,000 US troops stationed in Japan. Hadnott had originally been accused of rape, but was found guilty of the lesser change of abusive sexual conduct. Japanese police initially apprehended Hadnott but released him after the girl dropped charges.

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16/4/08

NSW Premier Morris Iemma and victims groups are leading the call for barristers to adopt new rules to prevent aggressive questioning of victims in sexual assault trials. The NSW government wants the NSW Bar Association to toughen up its regulations and to discipline barristers who directly or incidentally harass or embarrass victims in the witness box. Current rules do not specifically address the issue of cross-examination of victims in such trials and NSW Attorney-General John Hatzistergos said that while the association had been open to some of the changes, there was some opposition.

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Suzanne Gamboa; 11/4/08;
A woman who says she was raped while working for a foreign contractor in Iraq has detailed the experience in a congressional hearing as another woman who made similar allegations before Congress last year listened and fought back tears.

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