DV Assault and AVO dismissed under s14 mental health application at Gosford Court

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Our client is 44 years old from wamberal who was charged by police for allegedly assaulting occasioning actual bodily harm to her husband. The police claimed that our client grabbed and scratched her husband. Her husband further claimed that our client also punched and kicked him. He made these allegations to the police when police arrived as police were recording his statement on body worm camera.

Interestingly, our client was the one who called police for help and told police that she grabbed him before police decided to charge her.

Our senior lawyer Keiran Khan did all the preparation and representation for our client. Keiran also made multiple attempts at negotiating with the prosecution to get the charge dismissed early. Regardless, police refused to drop the charge and AVO.

Our client who was also suffering from PTSD following the suicide of her father only months before this incident was going through a difficult time. Our Keiran meticulously prepared her case. We obtained detailed expert psychologist report and other subjective materials in support for attempting to get the charges dismissed through a section 14 mental health application (formerly known as a s32 application).

Keiran and our client appeared at the Gosford Court house where the mental health section 14 application was made and after lengthy persuasive submissions by our Keiran, the application was successfully granted. The charge was immediately dismissed without the matter going any further to hearing, putting an end to the case with no conviction or penalty against our client.

The AVO was also dismissed in court.

The dismissal of the charge, meant that our client who was concerned of even being in a position where she could walk away with a conviction, given her occupation as a counsellor, meant that she was able to move on with her life while maintain her career. Getting the AVO dismissed also allowed her to keep her working with children check clearance without issues.

Published on 19/08/2022