Mr Banks on contempt charge

Press, 24 December 1986, Page 1

Mr Banks on contempt charge

Wellington reporter The member of Parliament for Whangarei, Mr John Banks, was yesterday charged with contempt of court in relation to his disclosure of a criminal defendant’s record of previous convictions. Mr Banks said the Whangarei resident Crown Law Office solicitor, Mr Philip Smith, delivered papers to him at his home. The Crown alleges contempt of court by Mr Banks and by the Broadcasting Corporation and Wellington Newspapers, Ltd. Mr Banks read out the past convictions of a man facing serious charges, while on a Radio New Zealand talk-back show in late October. His disclosure was also the subject of newspaper reports. Mr Banks said yesterday it was ironic he

should find himself in trouble with the law while “vicious criminals with mind-boggling records for violent offending” were able to keep reoffending.

He said that he had never attempted to compromise the rights of any individual about to face proceedings. He would continue his “campaign,” on behalf of a silent majority of law-abiding New Zealanders, against violent offending. Sir Robert Muldoon (Nat., Tamaki) called on the Attorney-General, Mr Palmer, to quash the prosecutions or have the Government seen as “running a police State.” Mr Banks’s prosecution was an action suited to "certain Third World countries where the Government brooks no opposition,” Sir Robert said. The responsibility, if the prosecutions went ahead, had to lie with Mr Palmer, he said.