VH-XXX,
Basically CASA bought 11 charges against an operator. Eight of those didn't get to court. The ones that did were dismissed by the magistrate even though the defendant pleaded guilty. This is rare, a mate who is a senior DPP solicitor (too senior to deal with magistrates courts) indicated so, even though it is allowed for under Vic law.
To sum up: CASA charged the operator with a VCA even though the operator had self-reported the incident to the ATSB, which is supposed to give you immunity from CASA prosecution. There are some exceptions to this immunity, such as if the VCA was intentional. I really don't know if this is why CASA bought the charge. What was alarming is that it was the only action taken against a VCA even thought there was over 4000 VCAs over a two-year period. The VCA concerned happened in 2005.
The defendant had to pay out $30K in legal fees and now the ICC is having a look at why those charges were bought in the first place.
There were some other charges involved in the incident, including something about a maintenance release not being signed, or not signed correctly. I was told but really don't remember the details right now. As I have said on two occasions before, the defendant has asked that intimate details not be made public on PPRuNe. Certainly that is a good idea. We need to let the CASA ICC investigation runs its course.
Apparently a de-identified story is going to appear in the next issue of the AOPA members magazine (it says so in the current issue). Once that is out, I suppose we can all go to town on this subject.
XXX, if you really want to know more, ring the person that you thought I was.
Walrus