The Snitch: Judge Craig Everson blasts Sally Dowling’s office over rape fail
Which judge has blasted Sally Dowling’s office over a failed rape case? What drug did a man give to a pizza driver? And we reveal the location of a cemetery put up as bail security for an underworld figure. The Snitch is here.
Police & Courts
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Another judge has blasted DPP Sally Dowling SC’s office for prosecuting a rape case that was doomed to fail.
On Thursday, District Court Judge Craig Everson SC questioned whether Ms Dowling’s office ran the case “without” or “in spite of” any attention to the actual facts of the case of a man accused of raping his girlfriend on a hiking holiday.
The woman accused the man of sexually assaulting her while she was in the middle of a yoga routine in their cabin on April 3, 2021.
She reported the man to police on December 27, 2022, and he was later charged.
It took until this year for the trial to go ahead, where the man was found not guilty.
On Thursday, Judge Everson ordered the state to pay his legal costs after finding the prosecuting office should not have run the case on the available evidence.
One of the key points included that the complainant gave inconsistent evidence relating to what she told her mother and friends about the alleged incident.
All were witnesses in the case and Judge Everson told the court Ms Dowling’s office should have been well across this before running the case.
“The weaknesses flowing from the glaring differences between what the complainant asserted she told her mother and friends … and what those complaint witnesses stated they had been told by the complainant meant the prosecution case was doomed to fail,” Judge Everson told the court.
“To be clear, I am of the opinion that this prosecution of the (accused man) was instituted, and maintained, either without, or in spite of, proper professional advertence as to whether there existed reasonable prospects of securing a conviction.”
Judge Everson, a former ODPP Crown Prosecutor, becomes the latest judge to apply the blowtorch to the prosecuting office for running a rape case that was doomed to fail.
It also raises questions over what has been learned after the results of the ODPP’s “audit” of rape cases, which found that 97 per cent of its sexual assault cases that ran over an eight-month period in 2024 met the standards to prosecute.
HE’S IMPROVING
Maroubra man Brett McAllister faced court for the second time in recent years earlier this month – but the good news is he’s improving.
In 2021, a magistrate wanted to jail him for attacking a pizza delivery man.
The court heard McAllister assaulted the driver for taking too long to deliver his ham and pineapple.
Instead of jail, McAllister got a suspended sentence after his lawyer, Peter Katsoolis, argued that his client was hangry.
Flash forward to June 2 and McAllister was back in the Downing Centre on another charge that again related to a pizza delivery driver.
This time the court heard McAllister handed the driver $25 cash for the pizza and 2.62 g of marijuana as a tip.
According to court docs, McAllister told the driver “Here is some weed for you, mate.”
Turns out that’s illegal too, and McAllister was fined $500 after pleading guilty to drug supply.
CEMETERY AS COLLATERAL
So it actually happened this week that an underworld figure accused of plotting to murder a rival put up a cemetery as collateral for his bail application.
Now we can bring you more details about the burial ground that Omar Haouchar put up as security in the NSW Supreme Court in his bid to get out of jail.
It wasn’t revealed in court, but Snitch can tell you that the Muslim-focused Greendale Garden Cemetery in Bringelly was put on the line in an attempt to get Haouchar released on bail.
The move caught Justice Ian Harrison by surprise.
“I’ve never seen a cemetery offered as security before,“ Justice Harrison told the court.
After a lengthy planning and construction period, the cemetery only opened last October.
Haouchar’s barrister Ertunc Ozen SC told the judge the value of the land was a bit tricky to figure out because it was not zoned for subdivision like the surrounding properties.
But given Sydney property prices, it will be worth in the millions.
The 32-year-old is behind bars on remand after being accused of plotting to murder bikie linked Andrew Kallita over an alleged big money debt.
Mr Ozen told the judge the prosecutors had no evidence to link his client to a chat handle that was allegedly used to plan the murder.
“This is the crux of the crown case, and without that attribution, the crown case fails,” Mr Ozen told the court.
It begs the question: Would Kallita have been buried in the cemetery if the police allegation that he was to be assassinated proved true?
Justice Harrison has reserved his decision on whether Haouchar will be granted bail
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