Teen crims’ guilty verdicts for assaulting guards overturned on appeal

A GROUP of teen offenders found guilty of violently assaulting justice officers at the Alice Springs detention centre have had the verdicts overturned on appeal

A GROUP of teen offenders found guilty of violently assaulting three youth justice officers at the Alice Springs detention centre have had the verdicts overturned on appeal.

The three youths — given the pseudonyms CC, KM and QS by the court — pleaded not guilty in the Youth Justice Court in August last year to assaulting the guards in June 2019.

They were each found guilty at trial, with judge David Bamber ruling QS had threatened one of the guards before deputy superintendent Phil Hughes directed him to come away and talk about it.

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Mr Bamber found QS took up a “fighting, or otherwise threatening, stance” and Mr Hughes “used force” against him and they both ended up on the ground where Mr Hughes restrained QS with another guard.

“Youth Justice Officer Hughes and Youth Justice Officer Bacon were justified in using force against QS,” Mr Bamber found.

“The youth justice officers behaved with ‘incredible restraint’ and used the minimum necessary force to passively restrain QS.”

Mr Bamber found QS then continued to struggle, “kicking wildly up and down with an attempt to strike the youth justice officers” and assaulted the two men by “spitting, biting and kicking” them.

“QS yelled out to the others in an attempt to incite them to commit further assaults on the officers and not to prevent an assault on himself,” Mr Bamber found.

“CC and KM pushed past officers and kicked Youth Justice Officer Hughes in the face and body.”

CC then punched another guard who tried to intervene in the jaw and Mr Bamber ruled none of the boys were acting in self defence.

But lawyers for the boys appealed the ruling in the Supreme Court, arguing the judge was wrong to conclude the officers were acting in the course of their duties.

In acquitting the youths, Justice Judith Kelly said prosecutors had not called any evidence to prove the centre’s superintendent had delegated his power to use force against the youths to his subordinates and therefore had failed to prove they were acting in the course of their duties.

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“It should be emphasised that this does not mean that the youth justice officers were acting unlawfully, as submitted by defence counsel at the trial and in written submissions on the appeal,” she said.

“It simply means that by neglecting to tender the instrument of delegation, the Crown failed to prove one element of the offences.”

All three youths were also found guilty of engaging in a violent act, with those verdicts upheld on appeal.

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