Gang Trial Judge Hits At Media
Sydney Morning Herald
Wednesday April 23, 2008
A JUDGE has delivered a scathing attack on media coverage of the Melbourne gangland war while continuing her ban on the planned Today Tonight broadcast titled "Crime Mums".
Justice Betty King said late yesterday that the interview between Barbara Williams and Judith Moran was no more than another example of glorifying those in the gangland war. "The educational value of this program is non-existent, the public interest in having it played is virtually non-existent," she said. Justice King also urged media organisations to examine closely the glorification of males in the families as "celebrities". She said the courts had been subjected to a barrage of media actions in recent years that forced them to grant suppression orders to protect fair trials. In a sometimes heated debate with Will Houghton, QC, for Channel Seven, Melbourne, she said she had not received an answer about why the program needed to be aired while the Supreme Court trial of Evangelos Goussis, 40, was continuing. Mr Houghton said interviews with the women were obtained in the past week or two. He said prosecution and defence counsel had blown the substance of the proposed program out of all proportion. He said it was "a chat between a reporter and two bereaved mothers". Justice King replied: "You must have watched a different program to me ... I might describe it as a lot of other things, but that certainly wouldn't spring to my mind." On Monday Justice King described the program as bizarre and poor. The suppression order stops Channel Seven showing and distributing it to associated entities until there is a verdict in the Goussis trial. Goussis has pleaded not guilty to the murder of Lewis Moran and the attempted murder of Moran's friend Bert Wrout at the Bruns- wick Club on March 31, 2004. The trial continues.
© 2008 Sydney Morning Herald
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