Sex Crimes by Nikki McWatters

Author:Nikki McWatters
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Psychological, Thrillers, Retail, Suspense, Fiction
Publisher: Eugenius Publishing, Sydney.
Published: 2013-08-29T04:00:00+00:00

PART TWO

16.

Magistrate Fred Hallinan

‘I understand you are facing some enormous challenges at the moment, Libby,’ I said, frowning over my specs.

The girl looked a mess. Like she’d just fallen out of bed.

‘But you can’t just burst in and disrupt court proceedings. There are rules about that.’

‘Sorry,’ she mumbled into her hand.

The girl didn’t look anything like the heavily made up woman in the photographs. She looked quite childlike and the idea that she was carrying a child of her own, disturbed me.

‘Libby is under enormous pressure and today is a pivotal day for her. She’s understandably nervous,’ Mia Bourke pleaded and put her hand out to pat the girl’s knee.

‘Yes, I understand,’ I began.

‘Just knowing that she will get some justice for the attack on her is so important for her healing…,’ she went on.

I put my hand up to silence her. I couldn’t drag this already difficult conversation out for any longer than necessary. I could see in the prosecutor’s flashing eyes that she knew what I was about to say.

‘I’m sorry Libby. Ms Bourke. But I am not committing this case to trial.’

The silence hurt me as much as it hurt them. No, that’s a trite and flippant thing to say. I was uncomfortable. Bourke looked furious and the girl looked …well, quiet. She just hung her head and picked at her nails.

‘It was all for nothing…’ she said in a low voice.

‘No it wasn’t,’ Mia Bourke said, putting her arm around the girl. ‘You spoke out. You were brave and strong and even though he won’t go to prison, his life will be prison enough. You did the right thing and everyone, all over the world, who has heard your story, knows him for what he is and they admire you.’

‘Rape convictions are notoriously difficult, Libby,’ I tried to explain. ‘Without the necessary evidence and I mean hard, cold evidence that we can put in front of us and look at, without that, these things fall over and a trial is most damaging not to the defendant but to the victim. To you. It would be a terrible ordeal for you with very little chance of raising a conviction. I’m sorry.’

She nodded.

‘And when she gives birth to Chris Bergin’s baby?’ Mia Bourke seethed. ‘What then Your Honour?’

‘Then she will have a case for appropriate child support and can launch a separate civil case for damages’

‘It’s bullshit!’ the prosecutor snapped. ‘Male bullshit.’

‘Don’t start that. I came to this hearing not as a man but as an objective Magistrate, a symbol, not of masculinity, but justice.’

‘That’s not justice. Where’s the justice for Libby?’ she continued, her sharp jaw quivering with anger.

‘Justice must play by the rules and there was not enough evidence to hope for even a chance at conviction. I did my job. You did yours and at the end of the day, this is how it has played out.’

I looked at the women. It was incomprehensible to think of this little girl and the scenario played out before me in my court room.

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