R v Brewer (No 1)

[2015] NSWSC 1471

Supreme Court

New South Wales

Medium Neutral Citation:	R v Brewer (No 1) [2015] NSWSC 1471
Hearing dates:	6 October 2015
Date of orders:	06 October 2015
Decision date:	06 October 2015
Jurisdiction:	Common Law
Before:	Bellew J
Decision:	See [17] and [19]
Catchwords:	CRIMINAL LAW – Practice and procedure – Application by media outlets for access to CCTV footage tendered by the Crown – Accused charged with murder – Trial before judge alone - Where Crown adduced evidence of CCTV footage of altercation between the deceased and the accused – Where CCTV footage depicted the last moments of the life of the deceased – Where Crown also adduced CCTV footage of the arrest of the accused in which the accused made disparaging comments about the deceased –– Where publication of the footage would be likely to cause further grief to the deceased’s family – Application for access denied – Where accused asserted that he was “embarrassed” by the statements made by him at the time of his arrest – Where that position was outweighed by principles of open justice – Application for access to that part of the footage granted.
Legislation Cited:	Criminal Procedure Act 1986
Cases Cited:	R v Abdallah (No 3) [2015] NSWSC 121
Category:	Procedural and other rulings
Parties:	Crown - Regina Adam James Brewer - Accused
Representation:	Counsel: Crown – Mr M Barr Accused – Mr P Skinner   Solicitors: Crown - Solicitor for Public Prosecutions Accused - Longton Legal
File Number(s):	2014/77670
Publication restriction:	Nil

Judgment ex tempore (revised)

1. This trial commenced before me earlier today, an order having been previously made that it proceed without a jury. The accused has pleaded not guilty to a charge that on 13 March 2014, at Pendle Hill in the State of New South Wales, he murdered Visakesvaran Velupillai (“the deceased”).

2. Much of the Crown case is not in dispute and has been dealt with by the agreed tender of a number of statements. I am informed that leaving aside any expert psychiatric evidence which might be adduced, there will only be one other witness called in the Crown case. The focus of the proceedings today has been upon the Crown’s playing of excerpts of CCTV footage of the period up to and including the death of the deceased.

3. I indicated to the Crown earlier today that I anticipated, given the nature and extent of that footage, that there would be an application for access to it by one or more media outlets. I have since been informed by the Court's media officer that in fact three commercial television stations have sought access to the footage. Whilst the information made available to me has not identified, with complete precision, the particular footage to which access has been sought, it is not unreasonable to anticipate that the focus is upon two particular areas.

4. The first concerns what footage of what is, on the Crown case, an altercation between the accused and the deceased in an arcade near the deceased’s…