DAMAGE TO GOALPOSTS

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33189, 31 March 1973, Page 15

DAMAGE TO GOALPOSTS

Appeal won in Australia (N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright) SYDNEY, March 30. The Australian Court of Criminal Appeal today quashed the conviction of two men charged over damage to goalposts during the 1971 South African Rugby tour of Australia. John Phillips, aged 33, and Robert Pringle, aged 31, had been found guilty last August of having maliciously damaged two aluminium goalposts at a Sydney ground where the South Africans played. They were both fined .$5OO, ordered to pay $5O compensation and placed on a goodbehaviour bond. They had pleaded not guilty. The Appeals Court said that the original judge had erred lin directing the jury that the I two had the onus of proving | the defence that reasonably ] supposed that they had a ] right to do what they did. I "Although the case for the ] Crown was very strong and ] although, properly directed, a jury might well he expected jto convict, the error of law I in the direction was such that ‘it would not be appropriate ]to dismiss the appeals . . . ion the ground that no substantial miscarriage of justice had actually occurred,” said Chief Justice Kerr. The three apoeal judges agreed that the appeals I should be upheld, the convicj tions quashed, and verdicts oi i acquittal entered.