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Posted October 23, 2014 at 9:51 pm | Permalink
Do we think the Heff was referring to s6 of the Crimes Act 1914:
“6 Accessory after the fact
Any person who receives or assists another person, who is, to his or her knowledge, guilty of any offence against a law of the Commonwealth, in order to enable him or her to escape punishment or to dispose of the proceeds of the offence shall be guilty of an offence.
Penalty: Imprisonment for 2 years.”
Unsurprisingly, the Crimes Act 1914 does not mention “misprision (of)felony”. According to John Menadue
The Revival of Misprision of Felony. Guest blogger: Kieran Tapsell | Pearls and Irritations
“The crime, according to Lord Denning in the 1962 House of Lords case, Sykes v The Director of Public Prosecutions, was more than 700 years old. It is so old that the word “misprision”, meaning “concealment” has disappeared from everyday use.
…
Misprision of felony was abolished in the United Kingdom in 1967, and all Australian States followed suit. New South Wales abolished it in 1990, and replaced it with a statutory form in S.316 of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW), making it an offence not to report a “serious” crime (one with a penalty of 5 years or more in prison) unless there was a reasonable excuse. The other States replaced it with a provision that made the concealment of a crime an offence only if the concealment was in return for some gain.”
Unfortunately for the Heff, the Criminal Code Act 1995 also fails to mention “misprision of felony” and only mentions “accessory after the fact” in the context of s6 of the Crimes Act 1914.
Perhaps Margie needed to say that there are many issues under corporate codes of conduct on integrity issues that will get you fired, but that the context of the breaches may be such that there is no certainty of successful prosecution for fraud.
Yet again, not enough information prior to sending out the lynch mob for mine.