Because the value of a dollar changes over time, Teina Pora's compensation payment for wrongful conviction was fundamentally unfair. The High Court has just reminded the Government of this apparently simple fact.
When the government announced in June of 2016 that it would be giving Teina Pora some $2.5 million as compensation for wrongfully convicting him and so keeping an innocent man in jail for some 20 years, his supporters’ joy was tempered with some anger.
Teina Pora has been given the thing he said he wanted most – a formal apology for the 22 years he wrongly spent behind bars as an innocent man. He also has been offered $2.5 million in compensation. Applying the Cabinet’s own principles, it ought to be in excess of $4.5 million.
[As promised here, these are some further thoughts on the announcement that Teina Pora has been given a full apology for his wrongful imprisonment and an offer of $2.5 million in compensation.
How much are 20-something years of a life worth? Later today we'll find out what the Government thinks - but here's some early thoughts on advance reports.
Some brief initial thoughts on the (assumed true) claim that it will be announced today that Teina Pora will be offered around $2 million in compensation for his 21-22 (I've seen both figures used) years in prison.
A (former) judge may be going to say that David Bain is not innocent beyond all reasonable doubt. That doesn't necessarily mean he won't get compensation, but it makes it a bit harder to do so.
According to the NZ Herald, by way of a fortuitous leak to Jared Savage, the report into David Bain's compensation claim by retired Australian Judge Ian Callinan, QC is in the hands of Minister of Justice Amy Adams. (Remember that a previous report on this matter by Canad
Teina Pora is out of jail at last. Just how is it that he's spent more than half his life in there?
Being Pundit readers, there's no real need for me to tell you that the title of this post comes from Franz Kafka's The Trial. I thought it an apt source for a discussion of the unease which Teina Pora's case causes me as a "lawyer", because his experiences through the legal system are the sort of thing that the overused term "Kafkaesque" for once actually fits.
