Dangerous Victoria police

A 16-year-old girl has reportedly taken out an intervention order against a senior constable she has accused of raping her in a park.

The order – preventing the officer from contacting or approaching her - was issued after the girl made multiple sexual assault allegations against him, according to The Age.

The incident in a park in Mildura is the latest allegation of serious predatory behaviour being investigated by an internal taskforce.

A Victoria Police spokesman confirmed the investigation with Daily Mail Australia.

Detectives from Taskforce Salus arrested the policeman on January 25 and he was suspended with pay, she said.

'The male senior constable from Western Region was interviewed in relation to sexual offences and misconduct in public office,' the spokeswoman said.

She added the alleged offences date back to December last year, but declined to comment on whether they are said to have occurred while the officer was on duty.

'The victim has been referred to appropriate support agencies,' she added. 'As the investigation is ongoing, it would not be appropriate to make further comment at this time.'

According to The Age, it took two months after the complaint was made for detectives to interview the girl.

It is also not clear whether she is the only alleged victim in the case.

Taskforce Salus was set up in November 2014 by then chief commissioner Ken Lay to crack down on sexual predators inside the force. It is responsible for handling internal complaints as well as those made by civilians. The taskforce's detectives have charged a number of officers with rape and child sex offences.

Earlier this year, it was revealed that 144 claims of sexual abuse or harassment have been made against serving officers in the year since the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission gave its reports after reviewing sexual discrimination within Victoria Police in December 2015.

Last year, chief commissioner Graham Ashton said Victoria Police was facing its 'biggest journey of cultural change' to overcome the sexism and predatory behaviour ingrained in the force.

<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4730632/Girl-16-takes-AVO-against-constable-accused-rape.html">SOURCE</a>

Disgusting Queensland police show no regard for the law

<i>They hate it that they don't have a total monopoly on gun ownership</i>

FOR a Justice of the Peace, Gympie gun dealer Ron Owen has had a lot of run-ins with the police. This month he further increased his lead over all rivals for the self anointed title, "most charged innocent man in Queensland." Claiming to have faced more than 2850 charges, he says he has beaten them all.

The Gympie Times reports that on Thursday Ron Owen revealed that he had now received one more vindication, when police withdrew an assault charge involving a person Mr Owen claimed was lawfully removed from his McMahon Rd gun shop.

The defence was that he acted lawfully, but that police did not when an officer seized the shop’s CCTV footage.

Mr Owen says the would-be customer had become agitated at the time staff took to finalise a eight-month old lay-by, so much so that Mr Owen refunded payments, rather than take responsibility for arming him. Yesterday Mr Owen said police wrote to him this week, saying the charge had been withdrawn.

But Mr Owen insists it is not a case of him beating the law. It has always been, he says, a case of the law protecting the citizen against sometimes mistaken agents of the state.

Some of his trouble started years ago, when he published a recipe for black powder, something which he says could also be found in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Then came the gun de-activation case, in which he was charged with de-activating guns other than by approved methods.

He made history (and The Gympie Times front page) by re-activating an approved replica in less than 15 minutes, at the bar table of the Gympie Magistrates Court, armed only with a screwdriver and pliers. The witness forced to acknowledge his point was the head of police Ballistics.

"I would have done it quicker if I’d remembered to put the firing pin back in the first time," Mr Owen said later. "And did you notice I didn’t use the pliers?"

Then came the gun buyback in which he proved, using data from police computers (purchased second hand at a police auction), that he was being paid less than anyone else for "millions of dollars worth of gun parts."

An attempt was once also made to cancel his gun dealer’s licence.

Once, after civil action in which police were ordered to pay costs, he says he had to take further action to force payment. At one point he and his family were offered witness protection by the then Criminal Justice Commission.

He refused, because it would have silenced him.

He wonders how many others, without such generous legal support, have suffered serious injustice.

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Bungled DNA evidence again

<i>It's not proof against crooked cops</i>

The son of a Melbourne mum murdered almost 40 years ago is angry police bungled the investigation by mixing up DNA evidence.

Victoria Police admitted on Thursday DNA taken from bloody pillowcase, and used to rule out priest Anthony Bongiorno as a suspect, came from an unrelated case.

Maria James, 38, was killed in 1980 in her Thornbury bookshop and the priest, who's since died, was a key person of interest.

Her sons Mark and Adam were 13 and 11, respectively, when she died.

The siblings have long suspected the Catholic priest was involved because he had abused Adam as a child. Adam James recently detailed his abuse to an ABC Trace podcast looking into the case. 'I remember he said to me 'Adam, can you come with me and I don't want you to tell your mum or Mark',' he told the ABC.

Bongiorno abused him before Ms James came to collect her son, Adam said.

Mark James says he's angry around the latest turn in the Victoria Police investigation. 'I am actually angry. I feel quite indignant,' he told ABC television on Thursday.

But despite the disappointment, Mark's also relieved. 'When I was originally told that Father Anthony Bongiorno had been eliminated through some form of DNA-type testing, I found it difficult to accept,' he said. 'But now that police have confirmed that Father Bongiorno and others are actually not eliminated, I'm feeling some relief.'

Victoria Police Assistant Commissioner Steve Fontana the DNA mix up was the result of a 'human error' made three decades ago.

'Basically, this means we need to go back and re-examine all the exhibits from the Maria James investigation.' Persons of interest previously ruled out of the investigation would now be re-examined.

'We've got to go back and ... see whether we can actually identify whether the offender has left any trace evidence behind,'Mr Fontana said. 'We don't have a profile on the suspect at this stage.'

Mark is seeking clarification about when the unrelated DNA was introduced to the investigation. 'I accept it was human error but the clarification I am seeking was, specifically, did this interference occur before Father Bongiorno became a suspect in this case?'

Mr Fontana said the error was discovered this year after a cold case inquiry into Ms James' death began. The James family say they have applied to the Victorian Coroner to re-examine the case as well.

Mr Fontana does not expect the exhumation of bodies, including the remains of Father Bongiorno, will be needed as a new investigation gets underway.

The admittance comes after it was revealed Ms James issued her son Mark a chilling warning just hours before her death. 'If anything happens to me, make sure [your brother] Adam is looked after,' she told him.

The conversation took place at the breakfast table, and by the time Mark, then 13, and his younger brother Adam, then 11, returned home from school, their lives had changed forever, reported ABC's Trace Podcast.

Father Bongiorno picked the boys up from school and broke the news.

It is believed she was killed with a small knife with a green handle, taken from her own kitchen drawer.

When she was killed, she was on the phone to her ex-husband John. She had briefly put down the phone and never returned.  Police arrived to find the phone still off the hook. 

Despite police finding blood at the scene which they believe belongs to the killer, Maria's murderer has never been found.

Officers investigated multiple leads, but all of them went cold. 

Detective Ron Iddles, who is widely regarded as Australia's greatest detective, was unable to solve the case, and though he retired from Victoria Police this year, will continue trying to hunt down the mother's killer. He told Trace the amount of stab wounds Maria received suggested her killer was certainly someone she knew.

'I've investigated over 320 homicides. Those where you have absolute multiple stab wounds like this, I don't think I've ever charged anyone where there is no connection between the killer,' he said.

<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4691182/Melbourne-police-examine-Maria-James-investigation.html">SOURCE</a>

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