Case: Court heard the matter in absence of our client and failed to provide notice to accused lead to Withdrawal of Charge.
Our client had contested an infringement notice for exceeding the speed limit and was self-representing himself. Unfortunately he had the Court dates mixed up and had missed a Court date. The Court proceeded to hear his matter in his absence and disqualified him from driving for 3 months. No advice or notice with respect to the licence disqualification was communicated by the Court and our client was subsequently intercepted driving whilst disqualified.
Charges/ Ch1 (driving whilst disqualified)
Result/ charge withdrawn
The charge required that police prove our client had been aware of the suspension. However our lawyer submitted that our client had not been provided with any information with regard to the Court hearing his matter in his absence and therefore was unaware of the licence disqualification. Prosecution agreed to withdraw the charge as the defence of honest & reasonable mistake could not be refuted as the notice of order from the Court hearing the previous matter confirmed that there was no appearance from our client and there was no evidence that the Court had ever sent our client the result of the case which was heard in his absence.