Our client, a man in his 30’s, was charged with Stealing. He had received correspondence from the Department of Transport regarding his seized personalised car registration plates (‘rego plates’), which led him to attend at a regional office to collect them. On arrival, CCTV footage showed our client at one of the counters speaking to a customer service officer. There is a 5 minute interval for which no footage is available. The CCTV next shows the same customer service officer in possession of the rego plates and a second customer service officer standing beside her. Minutes later, both customer service officers walk away from the counter but leave the rego plates behind. Our client reached over the counter took the rego plates, casually walked out the front door and through the carpark.
We presented a submission to the prosecution, which emphasised our significant disadvantage in establishing what had transpired in the 5 minutes of ‘missing’ CCTV, particularly our client’s insistence that the rego plates were handed to him and then rescinded from his grasp. We provided the prosecution with a psychological report explaining how our client’s recent diagnosis with level 2 Autism contributed to his honestly held belief that he was entitled to possession of the rego plates, notwithstanding the customer service officers’ unsuccessful attempts to explain to the contrary after she decided against handing them back to our client.
The submission was rejected 4 weeks out from trial, with no explanation provided. However, three days out from trial, the prosecution revisited our correspondence and changed their mind. On what was meant to be the trial date, the prosecution discontinued the charge against our client. Our costs application was awarded in full, including the cost of the psychological report which was central to supporting our proposed line of defence.
