KEY POINTS:
It may soon become easier for courts to be told of a defendant's previous convictions following public outrage over the police sex trial in which two men were acquitted of rape charges while serving prison time for another sex case.
In the trial, stemming from allegations made by Louise Nicholas against Assistant Police Commissioner Clint Rickards and former policemen Brad Shipton and Bob Schollum, the three men were acquitted.
It was later revealed that Shipton and Schollum were serving prison sentences from a previous rape case - a fact that could not be revealed until after their acquittals because of suppression orders and rules preventing the disclosure of previous convictions.
The Law Commission yesterday released a discussion paper on the issue and called for public submissions.
The paper discusses to what extent a person's past convictions or any similar offending should be revealed to juries. It also considers the use of evidence of a defendant's bad character. It suggests a range of potential options for people to consider.
Law Commission president Sir Geoffrey Palmer said the review was being conducted at the request of the Government after the police sex trials. The review was complex and surrounded what had always been a difficult area of the law, he said.
"What we're doing here is trying to reach a balance between the fairness of the situation for the accused's point of view and the fairness of the evidence of propensity - whether it be by way of previous conviction or by way of previous conduct."
Auckland defence barrister Gary Gotlieb last night met news of the discussion paper with "unease".
He said it had the potential to make the already difficult task of defending a client harder.
"Just because someone's got some convictions doesn't mean to say they have committed that particular offence."
Mr Gotlieb said it was likely he would make a submission on the review, but it was too soon to say how any changes might affect him. "We'll see what's proposed."
Police Association president Greg O'Connor welcomed the review.
He said he did not believe juries needed to have an offender's full history but that more work could be done relating to disclosing evidence of past crimes when an offender was on trial for similar offences.
* Submissions close on February 15. Details at www.lawcom.govt.nz
